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A QUEEN AT BAY 



THE STORY OF 

CRISTINA AND DON CARLOS 



BY 

EDMUND B. d'AUVERGNE 

■ \ 
Author of 
The EngHsh Castles," " Lola Montez : an Adventures 
of the Forties " 



WITH ILLUSTRATIONS 



V. V Quicquid delirant reges, plectuntur Achim. — HOR., Epist. 



NEW YORK 
JOHN LANE COMPANY 

MCMX 



PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN 



WARt t9n 



PREFACE 

CRISTINA of Spain was a very human, pas- 
sionate woman, whose lot it was to save her 
daughter's throne and unwillingly to preside at the 
coming of age of a great nation. These mighty 
tasks she accOxTiplished not by the exercise of any 
great talents o.- genius for statecraft, but by dint of 
pluck and plain common-sense. Her family affairs 
were bouixc. up with Spain's, and she approached the 
problems of government in much the way she 
would have considered the affairs of her household. 
She proved equal to her responsibilities because she 
never adequately realized them. She was able to 
contend with the forces remodelling Europe because 
she never realized their greatness or their strength. 
She was wedded to no theories, identified herself 
with no principles, understood no abstractions. 
Her deadliest rival, Don Carlos, knew not the 
meaning of either compromise or opportunity. 
Cristina understood both. Her aims were always 
personal, and in everything she saw personal 
considerations and factors. To maintain her child's 
throne, she drove a bargain with the Spanish people. 



vi Preface 

Isabel kept the crown and the people got their 
constitution. And to her credit be it said, Cristina 
in after years emphatically protested against any 
attempt to revoke the liberties she had found it 
expedient to grant. 

She was always more a woman than a queen. 
Her sound good sense was swept overboard by 
her passion for a handsome guardsman ; and there- 
after she thought much more of her duties as wife 
and mother than of her responsibilities as a ruler. 
She was anxious to marry her daughters well, and 
it seemed to her that she was as free to choose their 
husbands as if they had been the children of a 
shopkeeper. She was the ordinary, good-natured 
practical woman, set on the throne by the chances of 
the hereditary system. 

There was a grim humour in the situation ; there 
was also tragedy. That the consequences were not 
fatal to Spain was due to the woman herself. 

EDMUND B. d'AUVERGNE. 



CONTENTS 



CHAPTER I 

PAGE 

THE BRIDE FROM NAPLES I 



CHAPTER II 
THE INFANTA ISABEL 22 

CHAPTER III 
CARLOS AND LUISA CARLOTA .... 37 

CHAPTER IV 
THE DEATH OF THE KING 4^ 

CHAPTER V 
A PRETENDER ERRANT 75 

CHAPTER VI 

A SECRET MARRIAGE AND OPEN WAR . . 93 

vii 



viii Contents 



CHAPTER VII 

PAGE 

QUEEN AND PARLIAMENT II7 



CHAPTER VIII 
WAR AND MEN OF WAR I36 

CHAPTER IX 
THE QUEEN AND THE SERGEANTS . . . I50 

CHAPTER X 
EXIT CARLOS I70 

CHAPTER XI 
THE DOWNFALL OF CRISTINA . . . . I92 

CHAPTER XII 
CRISTINA IN EXILE 214 

CHAPTER XIII 
THE DOWNFALL OF ESPARTERO .... 239 



Contents ix 



CHAPTER XIV 

"PAGE 

THE SPANISH MARRIAGES 255 



CHAPTER XV 
CROWNS IN PROSPECT AND IN PERIL . . . 275 

CHAPTER XVI 
THE END OF A QUEEN AND A WOMAN . . 293 

AUTHORITIES 3II 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

MARIA CRISTINA, QUEEN OF SPAIN . . . FrOfltispiece 

FACING PAGE 

FERNANDO VII 24 

DON CARLOS 64 

DONA FRANCISCA DE ASIS, WIFE OF DON CARLOS . . 88 

ZUMALACARREGUI 112 

ESPARTERO I48 

MARIA CRISTINA, QUEEN OF SPAIN I76 

GENERAL NARVAEZ I94 

ISABEL II. IN 1842 224 

AGUSTIN FERNANDO MUNOZ, DUKE OF RIANSARES . . 256 

DON FRANCISCO DE ASIS, HUSBAND OF ISABEL II. . . 262 

DON ENRIQUE 280 

MARIA CRISTINA, QUEEN DOWAGER OF SPAIN . . . 302 



XI 



A QUEEN AT BAY 

CHAPTER I 

THE BRIDE FROM NAPLES 

QUEEN AMALIA was dead, and his Catholic 
Majesty Fernando VII., King of Spain, found 
himself in the year 1829 a widower for the third 
time. His wives, who had never met in life, were 
brought together in death, for all three lay in that 
dark, stifling chamber in the Escorial reserved for 
the princesses who had not given heirs to the throne 
of Spain. There lay Maria Antonia of Naples, who 
had died before her husband and his family were 
swept out of their kingdom into the nets of 
Napoleon ; there lay Isabel of Braganga, whose 
death, some said, had been hastened by her husband's 
infidelities ; and now came to join them the pale, 
gentle Saxon Queen who had for ten years contrived 
to exist in the midst of the storms that unceasingly 
shook her husband's throne. 

She was made for the cloister, not the court ; and 
indeed, they told a story in Saxony that she had 

I 



2 A Queen at Bay 

not died, but had sought refuge in a convent in 
Thuringia. The physicians who certified her death 
at Aranjuez attributed it to bronchitis, but those 
who saw her in her coffin thought of poison. The 
lily-white countenance had turned black as a negro's. 

There were many at the court of Spain who 
might have wished the Queen dead. Dynastic 
considerations had determined her marriage ; they 
might not inconceivably have determined her re- 
moval. Fernando wanted a son ; and Amalia had 
disappointed him. On the other hand, some 
reflected, she was in the bloom of youth ; and those 
whose hopes ran exactly counter to the King's might 
well have breathed more freely when Amalia was 
laid with her predecessors in that awful palace 
dedicated by Philip II. to Death. 

Fernando knew that men now looked upon his 
brother, the Infante Carlos, as the future King of 
Spain. The reflection was less agreeable to the 
reigning monarch than it might have been some 
years before. A warm affection had then united the 
brothers. They had been constant companions in 
boyhood ; they had been fellow-captives at Valen^ay. 
Carlos was four years younger than the King, being 
at the time of the Queen's death in his forty-second 
year. Their characters were not altogether dis- 
similar. Both were essentially hard-hearted, callous 
men, utterly reckless of human life, wholly indifl^erent 
to human suffering. But while Fernando may be 
truthfully said to have had no moral sense whatever, 



The Bride from Naples 3 

Carlos was redeemed from downright baseness by his 
sincere attachment to religion. His faith — and that 
alone — had made him whole. He was honest and 
upright, a faithful husband, a stern but devoted 
father, a loyal subject. He scrupulously performed 
the duties prescribed by his church ; where the 
catechism was silent, his native ferocity, selfishness, 
and arrogance asserted themselves. He would have 
been as great a scoundrel as his brother had he been 
less devout a Catholic. 

With this ardent attachment to the church Don 
Carlos combined an exaggerated sense of the dignity 
and prerogatives of kingship. (He was heir pre- 
sumptive to a throne, it should be remembered.) 
That monarchs were directly appointed by God to 
govern men, he never doubted. Spain — the land 
and the people — was in his view the absolute gift of 
the Almighty to his branch of the house of Bourbon. 
Rebellion was the favourite sin of Satan. Talk of 
the rights of the people, of the consent of the 
governed, of constitutions and liberty, sounded to the 
prince like the ravings of a blasphemous lunatic. 
A subject, he would have argued, had no rights 
other than those expressly conceded to him by the 
church and the monarch. Don Carlos, in short, 
was more Catholic than the Pope, and more 
Royalist than the King. 

It was this exaggeration of principle, paradoxically 
enough, that brought him into passive rivalry with 
his own sovereign and brother. The government of 



4 A Queen at Bay 

Fernando VII. ought, it seems to us, to have fulfilled 
the hopes of the most extravagant absolutists and 
reactionaries. The rule of the Shah was enlightened 
and liberal in comparison. Upwards of 6,000 
persons suffered death during the reign for political 
offences. At Granada you may see the spot where 
Dona Mariana Pineda was publicly garrotted, in the 
flower of her age, solely for having embroidered a 
tricoloured flag. Every university in the kingdom 
had been closed, not excepting that of Cervera, 
which merited exemption for its having professed its 
horror of " the fatal mania of thinking." Fernando 
had done his best to undo ten centuries, and had 
loaded his subjects with the chains for which they 
had literally clamoured in 18 14. He might cer- 
tainly have reckoned on the gratitude of all good 
reactionaries. But the tyrant was shrewd. He 
governed solely in his own interests, and showed no 
disposition to share his power with favourite or 
with prelate. He was a despot to serve his own 
ends, not out of principle. He had no principle. 
His most strenuous supporters began to see that an 
autocracy does not necessarily imply a theocracy. 
They wanted another Philip IL, not a personal 
ruler of the Joseph II. type, enlightened or unen- 
lightened. They had not dreamed of a King of 
Spain absolute and independent even of the Catholic 
Church. Fernando refused to re-establish the Inqui- 
sition, for the excellent reason that the other 
European powers would not tolerate it. His refusal 



The Bride from Naples 5 

wounded the Ultramontanes to the quick. It was a 
poor consolation to shoot the Liberals if you could 
not burn the heretics. Some of the King's ministers 
were suspected, moreover, of scheming to promote 
the material and commercial prosperity of the 
country. It was clear that no reliance could be 
placed on Fernando. Towards his brother, the 
pious Carlos, the eyes of the Apostolic party (as they 
called themselves) affectionately turned. He was 
credited with a desire to re-establish the Holy Office. 
It was time, it was whispered, to dethrone the auto- 
crat and to make the devout Infante King. The 
proposal was actually formulated in the manifesto of 
a society which assumed the significant title of the 
Exterminating Angel. 

Fernando was kept well informed of the projects 
of the Apostolics and took steps in good time to 
frustrate them. One of the Clerical chiefs. Fray 
Cirilo Alameda, the Superior-General of the Fran- 
ciscans, was relegated, rather than exiled, to the 
south of Spain. Revolts broke out in Valencia and 
Cataluna, to be suppressed with the utmost rigour, 
and the members of the society of the Exterminating 
Angel were themselves almost exterminated by the 
Comte d'Espagne (or de Espana), a French officer 
who had turned his arms against his own country- 
men and had risen to high rank in the Spanish 
service. 

Don Carlos himself rejected the proposals of the 
extreme Apostolics with horror, avowing his un- 



6 A Queen at Bay 

swerving loyalty to his brother. Notwithstanding, 
upon his appearance one day at La Granja, he was 
received by the officer in charge of the guard with 
royal honours, though the King was in the palace at 
the time. The Infante was furious, and reported 
the matter to the Comte d'Espagne, command- 
ing the household guards. The indiscreet subaltern 
was placed under arrest, but three days later was 
set at liberty and promoted. He owed his good 
fortune to the personal intervention of the real chief 
of the Apostolics, the Infante's wife, Dona Francisca 
de Asis. This lady was considerably younger than her 
husband (whose niece she also was), being no older 
than the century. She was the sister of Fernando's 
second wife, Isabel of Bragan9a, and of Dona Maria 
Teresa, widow of the King's cousin, the Infante 
Pedro, who resided at the court of Madrid. These 
princesses were the daughters of King Joao VI. of 
Portugal and his masterful Queen Carlota. Dona 
Francisca was very much her mother's daughter. 
She was a fanatical Catholic, and as zealous a royalist 
as her husband ; but it is not likely that she had 
much love for the sovereign who was said to have 
broken her sister's heart. She would probably have 
witnessed his dethronement without regret. It is 
practically certain that she was implicated in the 
rising which cost its leader, the unfortunate 
Bessieres, his life. Nor can there be any doubt that 
she was in correspondence with the rebels of Cata- 
luna, and that she was, in short, a party to all the 



The Bride from Naples 7 

intrigues of the Apostolic faction. Her complicity 
was no secret to Fernando, but he could not have 
risked an open rupture with a Prince and Princess 
who were idolized by the whole royalist and clerical 
party of Spain. He had no doubts of his brother's 
loyalty, but his affection for him was considerably 
weakened by these dangerous intrigues. Dona 
Francisca cared little for that. For years past she 
had considered herself the future Queen of Spain, 
and in her presence and under her influence the 
actual Queen became a mere puppet. In after 
years it was said of the Portuguese Infanta that she 
was the only man in her family. But her preten- 
sions and domination did not go uncontested even 
in the lifetime of Queen Amalia. 

Fernando had another brother, the Infante Fran- 
cisco de Paula, ten years younger than he. This 
Prince was born when the famous Godoy stood 
especially high in the favour of Queen Maria Luisa. 
Hence certain suspicions were conceived with regard 
to his origin, which were strengthened by the total 
want of resemblance between him and his brothers. 
Finding his position at court somewhat equivocal, 
the Prince endeavoured to ingratiate himself with 
the people. He assumed a free and affable manner, 
and cultivated the fine arts. Learned societies found 
in him a generous patron. From all this it was 
inferred that the Infante Francisco was somewhat 
less of a bigot and a reactionary than his brothers. 
By marriage he was allied with a court as ob- 



8 A Queen at Bay 

scurantist as that of Spain. His wife Luisa Carlota 
was his own niece, the child of Francesco I., King 
of the Two SiciHes, and Maria Isabella, daughter 
of Carlos IV. of Spain. Though only fifteen 
years of age when she left Naples (1819), this 
Princess soon exhibited something of the spirit 
of her half-sister the intrepid Duchesse de Berry. 
She bitterly resented the invidious position of her 
husband, and the manner of superiority assumed 
in consequence by the Portuguese Infantas. Of 
these she might have been considered in a sense 
the natural antagonist : they were the sisters of 
Fernando's second wife, and she was the niece of 
the first. Acquiescing in her husband's policy, she 
dissociated herself from the extreme absolutists 
grouped round the throne. Such an attitude was 
more than the haughty princesses of Braganga could 
brook. The Queen-Consort bowed before them, 
and it was intolerable that a newcomer, a schoolgirl 
from Naples, should presume to withhold her 
adhesion to their openly expressed views. It 
became the aim of Dona Francisca to identify 
the younger Infanta with the liberal party, and 
so to alienate the King's favour from her and 
her husband. 

The longed-for opportunity presented itself in 
1823. In that year Louis XVIII. sent an army 
of one hundred thousand men, commanded by the 
Due d'Angouleme, into Spain, to subvert the 
constitution and to restore the unfettered tyranny 



The Bride from Naples 9 

of Fernando. Very much against their will — nay, 
almost an inch at a time — the King and his family 
were carried south by the constitutional ministers 
and their partisans, first to Seville, and finally to 
Cadiz, now as in 1808 the last bulwark of Spanish 
freedom. Before long the white island city was 
beleaguered by sea and land. Providence was on 
the side of reaction and the big battalions, and at 
the end of three months the defenders were forced 
to ask for terms. But the Due d'Angouleme 
refused to treat with any one but Fernando, and 
demanded that he should be set at liberty at once. 
Instead of clapping his Majesty into prison and 
holding him as a hostage for the liberties he had 
so often guaranteed, the constitutionalists yielded. 
On October i, 1824, Generals Valdez and Alava 
were deputed to escort the King into the French 
lines. Glancing neither to right nor left, and 
followed by the rest of his family, Fernando walked 
with his Queen's arm in his, through the clean 
lane-like streets of Cadiz, to the barge prepared for 
his reception. Less than an hour later, the keel 
grated on the strand of Puerto Santa Maria, on 
the opposite side of the bay, where the Due 
d'Angouleme was waiting with his staff to receive the 
party. With sensations of relief that may well be 
imagined, Fernando stepped ashore and embraced 
his deliverer. The Queen and the Portuguese 
Infantas now threw back their pelisses and appeared 
in white costumes, embroidered, out of compliment 



10 A Queen at Bay 

to the French Prince, with golden lilies. Purposely 
kept unprepared for this display, the Infanta Luisa 
Carlota now found herself, to her unspeakable 
mortification, the only royal lady who exhibited no 
symbol of sympathy with the triumphant House of 
Bourbon. She realized that she had fallen into a 
trap deliberately set for her — by whom, she well 
knew. She was the last woman in the world to 
forgive or to forget such an affront. From that 
time onwards the wives of the King's brothers were 
open enemies. 

Dona Francisca gained nothing by this paltry 
trick. Fernando's judgment was not warped by 
such jejune manoeuvres. During the years that 
followed the iniquitous intervention of France, the 
excesses of the Apostolic party brought upon the King 
the censure of the great powers and alarmed him 
for the safety of his throne. Across the frontier he 
beheld Franciscans mother attempting to depose her 
husband. King Joao — an attempt which resulted 
in her Majesty's imprisonment in a nunnery, and 
which could hardly have strengthened Fernando's 
confidence in his Portuguese relations. The 
Kings of Spain and Portugal might well have 
exclaimed. Save us from our friends ; our enemies 
we can strangle and shoot. The measure of support 
Fernando gave, at the instance of the Apostolic party, 
to Francisca's hopeful brother, Dom Miguel, very 
nearly brought down upon him the thunderbolts 
of England. Altogether he began to grow weary 



The Bride from Naples ii 

of his troublesome and overbearing sisters-in-law of 
Braganga, and did nothing to discourage the forma- 
tion of a party openly opposed to them, which 
acknowledged the leadership of the Infanta Luisa 
Carlota. 

At first sight it must have seemed that the death 
of the Saxon Queen had extinguished this rivalry 
and assured the victory to the Portuguese faction. 
Carlos the Pious, as his admirers styled him, was 
twice as great a man as he had been, and his 
Consort's sense of her own dignity and importance 
was proportionately inflated. She was now incon- 
testably the first lady in Spain. The prospect was 
not a cheerful one for those who wished well to 
their country. Men heard already in imagination 
the faggots of the Inquisitors crackling round their 
feet, and saw the cowled monk standing between 
the throne and the people. At Lisbon the future 
Queen's brother had instituted a reign of terror 
which surpassed Fernando's finest performances in 
brutality and injustice. Crossing the strains of 
Bourbon and Bragan^a appeared to result in the 
worst type of man known since Domitian and 
Commodus ; and Don Carlos was the father of 
three sons. But these, the Neapolitan Princess was 
resolved, should never reign over Spain. The 
moment had come to play the card she had long 
held in readiness. 

Francesco I. of Naples had a family of thirteen 
children, and Luisa Carlota had at that time five un- 



12 A Queen at Bay 

married sisters. Of these the eldest was the Princess 
Maria Cristina, who was born at Palermo on April 27, 
1806, and was therefore eighteen months younger 
than the Infanta. Till the downfall of Napoleon 
and his lieutenant, Murat, Francesco's dominions 
were confined to the island of Sicily, and it is said 
that owing to this enforced isolation his children 
did not receive as thorough an education as befitted 
their rank. But Cristina's natural ability, like that 
of her two elder sisters, early manifested itself The 
plant Man, some one has remarked, grows more 
vigorously in Italy than elsewhere, and the shoots of 
the old decayed tree of Bourbon in this new soil in 
some instances displayed amazing vitality. Cristina, 
when a child, gave proof of no mean skill as a 
painter, and she cultivated the art during the rest of 
her long life with a success that many a professional 
would have envied. Italian in this respect, she was 
like an Englishwoman in her fondness for sports 
and physical exercise. She was an intrepid and 
accomplished horsewoman and a good shot. Blood 
seems to have had much less to do with the forma- 
tion of her character than had her native air and 
soil, for though Bourbon on both sides, she was 
a true Sicilian — a full-blooded, passionate animal, 
conscious of every one of her faculties, eager to put 
forth her strength, impatient of all restraint. In 
her girlhood she is said to have been beautiful, as 
so many royal persons are alleged to be. Inclined 
like most of her nation to stoutness rather early in 



The Bride from Naples 13 

life, she was, it is easy to believe, pretty enough in a 
coarse, voluptuous style. Her exuberant health 
and spirits, coupled with a natural desire to please, 
made one overlook the want in her form of real 
grace and regularity of feature. 

This was the Princess whom her sister, Luisa 
Carlota, had long thought of as the successor to the 
weakly Queen of Spain. That her plans had been 
matured in good time, that she had prepared her 
father and the girl herself beforehand, cannot well 
be doubted, seeing the rapidity with which she was 
now able to put her projects into execution. The 
most determined Benedicts might well have been 
discouraged after three brief and childless experiences 
in matrimony, but Luisa Carlota did not despair 
of Fernando. He was a domesticated creature, this 
bloodthirsty tyrant, and though by no means averse 
to illicit and irregular amours he appreciated the 
joys of a wife and fireside. On this amiable side 
of his character the astute Princess worked, com- 
miserating him on the loneliness of his widowed 
state, reminding him that he was not yet forty-five 
years old. Most roues approaching their half-century 
like to be told they are marrying men, even when 
they have buried three wives. The bereaved 
Fernando found the suggestions of his sister-in-law 
very soothing and agreeable. They appealed, more- 
over, very eloquently to the lurking distrust and 
jealousy of his brother and heir-presumptive to 
which the events of the past six years had given 



14 A Queen at Bay 

rise. Why Indeed should he not marry again ? 
People hinted that his constitution was worn out, 
that he was the wreck of a man ; it would tickle 
the King's Quilp-like humour to undeceive them. 
But whom should he marry ? Luisa Carlota pro- 
duced a portrait of her sister — a portrait painted 
expressly for this purpose, wherein, we may be sure, 
something more than justice was done to Cristina's 
youthful charms. The still-susceptible monarch was 
impressed. Here would be a bride glowing with 
youth and health — a bride very different from the 
Dresden-china shepherdess from whom death had 
just divorced him. Fernando VII. became en- 
amoured of the girl he had never seen. He sought 
an excuse for this fourth and disproportionate 
union. 

The ministers of despotic sovereigns exist mainly 
for the purpose of supplying excuses. There was, of 
course, no parliament in the land to which British and 
French bayonets had secured paternal rule ; but there 
was an ancient and effete consultative body known 
as the Council of Castille. According to instructions 
from above, this venerable corporation met, and 
petitioned the King to contract another alliance for 
the benefit of the nation ; and the King graciously 
promised to give ear to their humble prayer. 
Within three months of Amalia's death, Don Pedro 
Gomez Labrador was sent to Naples to demand the 
hand of the Princess Maria Cristina in marriage ; 
and on September 9, 1829, in the presence of his 



The Bride from Naples 15 

court, King Francesco and his Queen gave their 
consent to their daughter's betrothal to her uncle 
the King of Spain. 

The Portuguese faction at the Court of Madrid 
was in consternation. Maria Francisca saw with 
unspeakable bitterness the cup of her triumph dashed 
down as she raised it to her lips. Her dismay- 
was shared by the Apostolic party generally. Very 
little indeed was known about Cristina, but it was 
sagely apprehended that she would adopt the com- 
paratively moderate views of her sister and her 
sister's husband, the despised Francisco de Paula. 
To expostulate with the King or to attempt too 
openly to thwart his wishes, no one, not even the 
Portuguese Princesses, dared. The devout persons 
in the interest of Don Carlos resorted to a campaign 
of calumny and insinuation to turn his Majesty 
from his purpose. One went so far as to hint that 
the Princess was already a mother. The royal 
reprobate grinned sardonically. " Ah," he replied, 
" that is the wife I want — one that is able to bear 
children." Others alleged that she was wanting 
in true piety, a reproach that sounded lightly in 
the ears of one who was himself at heart a sceptic ; 
others again said that she was half a liberal, but 
Fernando knew that this could not be true of 
Francesco's daughter. Moreover he was no more 
frightened of half-hearted liberals than of frantic 
reactionaries. He was strong enough to make both 
obey him, and shrewd enough to see that all these 



i6 A Queen at Bay 

slanders had no other object than the promotion 
of his brother's interests. 

Before the King's inflexible determination, the 
Apostolics could only bow. The negotiations be- 
tween the courts of Madrid and Naples proceeded 
rapidly. What Cristina herself thought of the 
projected union, we are not told. As a Princess 
and an Italian, she was not entitled to be consulted 
as to the disposal of her person. It was hardly 
a suitable match from our northern point of view, 
this between a blooming girl of twenty-three and 
a gouty libertine nearly twice her age. Fernando's 
matrimonial record was not encouraging ; and as 
regards the state of his kingdom, he had himself 
compared it to a bottle of beer of which he was 
the stopper. But no misgivings troubled the minds 
of the bride-elect's parents. The betrothal was 
celebrated at Naples with befitting ceremony and 
public rejoicing, and on September 14 the King and 
Queen set forth to accompany their daughter to 
Spain. They halted at Florence to sign the marriage 
contract, which was at the same hour subscribed 
to by Fernando at Madrid in presence of Don 
Carlos himself, his disgusted wife and sister-in-law, 
and the leading representatives of the clergy and 
aristocracy. On this most mortifying occasion 
Dona Francisca was spared the triumphant glances 
of her deadly foe ; for Luisa Carlota had gone 
with her husband to meet her sister and parents 
upon their entry into France. 



The Bride from Naples i7 

The Neapolitan royal party arrived at Grenoble 
on October 31 and found a family group awaiting 
them. Cristina was welcomed not only by the 
Infanta, but by her elder sister, the Duchesse de 
Berry, and her father's sister, Marie Amelie, Duchesse 
d'Orleans. There also she met her aunt's husband, 
the Due Louis Philippe, whose acquaintance she 
was to renew in after-years in very different circum- 
stances. Through Valence, Avignon, Montpellier, 
and Nimes the bridal party passed on, amid the 
waving of white flags, through triumphal arches 
gay with golden lilies, among a people who seemed 
hysterical with love for the Bourbons. Three years 
later the Duchesse de Berry was to traverse part 
of the same route, a solitary fugitive, pursued by 
the agents of her aunt's husband, who now accom- 
panied her. Their Sicilian Majesties travelled with 
their daughters in an open caleche towards the 
Pyrenees. An English traveller who saw the 
future Queen of Spain at Nimes was delighted by 
her merry, irresponsible mood. The Moniteur 
wrote : " The Princess Maria Cristina has heard 
her name mingled in the air with that of her whose 
son [the Comte de Chambord] is one day to be 
King of France. Happy the new Queen if her 
presence shall deliver Spain from the factions that 
still divide it, and if, finding beyond the mountains 
the same order, devotion, prosperity, as in our 
provinces, she can cry, ' There are no more 
Pyrenees.' " 

2 



i8 A Queen at Bay 

The wish was the echo of the hope that animated 
all the true friends of Spain. In Fernando's fourth 
marriage the liberals recognized at least a check to 
the schemes and influence of the absolutists. They 
listened eagerly to the rumour circulated by Cristina's 
enemies that she was half a liberal herself, and 
made a bold bid for her favour and alliance. 
Assisted, it is probable, by Marie Amelie and her 
husband, a number of Spaniards exiled on account 
of their liberal views were able to obtain speech 
with the Princess on her way through France. 
They appealed to her compassion, and besought her 
to procure for them the King's pardon. The 
good-natured girl was touched by these appeals, 
backed as they were by the counsels of Luisa 
Carlota and the Duchesse d'Orleans. She promised 
to use her influence in favour of the exiles, and 
sent them away filled with hope. Promises made 
by royal persons on such occasions are not to be 
taken seriously as a rule ; a King's word is emphatic- 
ally not his bond. But Maria Cristina was true 
to hers. 

The royal cortege reached the Spanish frontier 
on November 13. The French troops from the 
fort of Bellegarde flanked the road. The heights 
were occupied by enthusiastic, shouting crowds of 
both nationalities, and salvo after salvo conveyed 
Spain's welcome to her King's bride. Beneath a 
triumphal arch, over which floated the flags of 
France, Spain, and Naples, the Comte d'Espagne, 



The Bride from Naples 19 

Captain-General of Cataluna, and the Conde de 
BornoSj greeted the Princess in the name of the 
King. The French Princesses took leave of the 
party and Cristina entered the land which she was 
destined to free from its worst oppressors. 

Her progress through Cataluna was a series of 
ovations. The rank and file of the reactionaries 
were not, of course, in the secrets of their chiefs, 
and in their zeal for royalty generally made no 
exception of the new Queen ; while the liberals 
had better reasons than they for thankfulness 
and rejoicing. Barcelona proudly exhibited its 
factories and workshops to the illustrious stranger, 
who, unlike her affianced husband, displayed no 
symptoms of boredom. But at Valencia she was 
less successful in affecting the interest required of 
her. At the cathedral — which is distinguished 
by the surname of the rich — ^she was shown the 
magnificent wardrobe of the local Madonna. 
The clergy observed with apprehension that the 
bride of the Catholic King glanced casually at 
this treasure and hurried on. " Her Majesty," 
said the sacristan to the French traveller, Charles 
Didier, shaking his head sadly, " remained only a 
few minutes in the church, and that very evening 
went, the first, to the ball, and was the last to leave 
it ! " " A Queen of Spain preferring the ball to 
the church, and letting it be seen ! " comments the 
Frenchman, — " a startling novelty indeed, and a 
matter for grave meditation in the cloisters ! '* 



20 A Queen at Bay 

At Ocana, in New Castille, the Princess was met 
by Don Carlos, his wife and sister-in-law. She was 
no doubt well informed of the disposition of these 
great personages towards her, and it must have 
been with a curious scrutiny that she and Dona 
Francisca first encountered each other. The Infante 
was correct, courteous, and dull, as he ever was. 
The position of an heir-presumptive who welcomes 
his elder brother's bride is an invidious one at best ; 
but a more painful ordeal was reserved for Carlos. 
Fernando not being, for some reason, at Aranjuez 
upon their arrival, the luckless Prince had to act 
as his brother's proxy, and to contract on his behalf 
the very alliance that destroyed his own hopes of 
the succession. The discipline of courts is harder 
than that of the drill-ground or the monastery. 

On December 1 1 Cristina met her affianced 
husband. Girls of her nation and rank are usually 
free from all sentiment on the subject of marriage, 
and the middle-aged, enfeebled tyrant of Spain 
was probably as attractive a partner as she had ever 
dreamed of. Luisa Carlota had left her, we may 
suppose, no illusions as to his character ; she had 
heard, no doubt, all about his amours with the 
manolas of Madrid ; but she was of stouter stuff 
than Isabel of Bragan^a and had no thought of 
dying of a broken heart. It was with a radiant 
countenance that the Princess entered the capital, 
in a costume of sky-blue, which colour henceforward 
became distinctive of her party. To the right of 



The Bride from Naples 21 

her carriage rode the King, to the left the Infantes. 
And so amidst the cheering of thousands, who felt, 
they knew not why, that the day was the dawn of 
a better era, between gleaming rows of bayonets 
and sabres, beneath banners and arches on which 
were written praises the most extravagant, to the 
sound of trumpets and cannon, Maria Cristina 
passed slowly through the streets of Madrid to 
give her hand to Fernando VII. in the church of 
Atocha. 



CHAPTER II 

THE INFANTA ISABEL 

THE cloud that hung over Madrid lifted slowly 
but sensibly ere the wedding chimes had en- 
tirely died away. Under the eye of Fernando VII. 
*' the white city of the serenade *' was gloomy and 
panic-stricken. There was practically no society, 
few entertainments private or public among the 
educated class (which was not, it should be said, 
numerous). " You could neither dance nor receive 
your friends," says Didier, " without the sovereign's 
special permission, which was seldom given, for a 
ball might become a revolt, a social gathering a 
conspiracy." It was always Good Friday at Madrid. 
Another French traveller (the Marquis de Custine) 
wrote : " Everybody was out of doors, but the town 
was quite silent. I know no capital less noisy than 
this. The fewness of the vehicles gives a particular 
character to the streets of Madrid — you are struck 
by their want of animation, just as in the houses 
you are amazed by the scarcity of furniture. The 
streets and squares, even when they are thronged 
with foot-passengers, seem bare. Many grandees 
have several carriages ; but, unlike the Italians in 

22 



The Infanta Isabel 23 

this as in most respects, they seldom use them and 
go on foot or on horseback. This may be because 
the streets are for the most part up-and-down and 
ill paved." 

Nowadays, it seems to me, a Spanish gentleman 
would rather be seen on the promenade in a wheel- 
barrow than on foot, and Madrid is perhaps the 
noisiest town in Europe except Naples. The change 
was inaugurated by Cristina. She was fond of 
pleasure and excitement, and had looked forward to 
married life, like all girls of Latin race, as the time 
of gaiety and emancipation. The cloistered life led 
by her predecessor was not to her taste. Fernando 
was delighted with his new wife, and could not 
refuse to indulge her passion for the dance. The 
sombre capital of the Spains was presently startled 
by the sound of revelry proceeding from the palace. 
The precedent encouraged the bolder spirits of 
Madrid society. It was no longer considered posi- 
tively treasonable to be gay. Balls were given by the 
aristocracy, and social functions assumed a livelier 
complexion. Fernando, having suppressed all the 
seats of learning, considered, under this new influence, 
how he might safely contribute to the happiness and 
improvement of his people. He accordingly founded 
a school for bull-fighters, or of tauromachy, as the 
polite art of butchering oxen is called in Spain. 
Having thus gratified the sporting instincts of his 
subjects, his Majesty permitted his consort to 
establish an academy of music in the capital. 



24 A Queen at Bay 

These were signs of the times indeed ; the gravity 
of Madrid relaxed, and Cristina so far endeared 
herself to the Spaniards that they publicly manifested 
their satisfaction when it was known, in the spring 
of 1830, that she was to become a mother. 

It may be imagined with what profound interest 
the announcement was heard by Don Carlos and 
his faction. Would the child be a boy or a girl ? 
On the answer to that question seemed to depend 
the fate of the nation. 

For, according to an ordinance passed in 17 13 
by Felipe V., the first of the Spanish Bourbons, 
no woman could inherit the crown so long as one 
of his male descendants existed. This law was an 
innovation obviously opposed to the customs and 
traditions of the monarchy. Not only had women 
in past times succeeded to the throne, but to a 
woman and its most illustrious sovereign — Isabel 
the Catholic — Spain owed its consolidation into one 
kingdom. 

Moreover both the House of Austria and the 
House of Bourbon itself obtained their titles 
through women, and Felipe thus attacked the very 
custom in virtue of which he wore the crown. The 
legality of his action was doubtful. The Council 
of Castille refused to recognize the new law till it 
had been approved by the Cortes ; but instead of 
convoking that body, the King arbitrarily renewed 
the mandates of the ex-deputies who were then in 
Madrid, and from them extorted some sort of con- 




From a lithograph after the picture by J. de Mandrazo 
FERNANDO VII. 



p. 34 J 



The Infanta Isabel 25 

stitutional sanction for the change. The ordinance 
which barred women from the succession also pre- 
ferred the male descendants of Felipe V. that were 
born in Spain. This clause, had it been remem- 
bered at the time of his accession, would have ex- 
cluded Carlos IV. from the throne, and for this 
reason that king proposed to rescind the whole 
law. He was strengthened in this resolve by his 
strong preference for his eldest child, the Infanta 
Joaquina Carlota ; and as she was married to the 
Crown Prince of Portugal, there was a remote 
possibility, in the absence of a SaUc law, of the 
whole peninsula being united under one sceptre. 
In 1789, accordingly, the Cortes were summoned 
to a special and secret meeting ; and, at the sug- 
gestion or rather the order of the ministers, they 
petitioned the King to restore the ancient law of 
succession. This Carlos promised to do, declaring 
that he would command his council *^ to draw up the 
pragmatic sanction customary in such cases." The 
Cortes were then dissolved, every member having 
been obliged to take an oath of secrecy regarding 
the decree, which for reasons only guessed at by us 
was not published and remained filed in the royal 
archives. 

There the all-important document lay unnoticed 
till the year 181 8, when Fernando VII. 's second 
wife gave birth to a girl-child. The King then 
looked through the papers relating to the succession ; 
as, however, the medical men told him that the 



26 A Queen at Bay 

infant could not possibly live for more than a few 
weeks, the question was not reopened. The 
constitution of 1812, subscribed to by Fernando in 
1820, reaffirmed the right of women to inherit the 
crown ; but the constitution had since been torn to 
shreds and disavowed, and so, in spite of these 
tentative efforts at revocation, the edict of 17 13 
had unquestionably the force of law at the beginning 
of the year 1830. It was the sheet-anchor of the 
Apostolic party. 

But Cristina had made up her mind that, son or 
daughter, her child should sit on the throne of 
Spain. She had already obtained a considerable 
ascendency over her husband, and had also won 
over his favourite Grijalba, the keeper of the privy 
purse. This man seems, even by Carlist accounts, 
to have been by far the most respectable member 
of the King's camarilla or backstairs cabinet. He 
was of humble origin, and gained a footing at the 
palace by marrying the daughter of Carlos IV.*s 
chief huntsman. He followed Fernando into exile 
at Valen^ay and into captivity at Cadiz, and during 
the brief constitutional regime was employed by 
his master as a spy upon the Parliamentary leaders. 
Mixing with the Liberals, he became tinged with 
their principles, and was able to moderate, in some 
slight measure, the violent tendencies of the Court. 
" So great was his ascendency," says Walton, "that 
the King treated him with marked deference, never 
joking with him as he was in the habit of doing 



The Infanta Isabel 27 

with other attendants, and even with his ministers. 
His hold upon his master's mind was the more 
secure, as he carefully abstained from soliciting any 
honours which could render him an object of either 
jealousy or envy. Having attained the summit 
of his ambition, and amassed a large fortune, he 
prudently remained behind the curtain, always 
within call. Through his agents, he was informed 
of everything passing in public, his reports often 
serving as a check upon the public employes. His 
advice frequently outweighed the opinions of the 
council." 

Unfortunately it had not often outweighed the 
influence of Don Tadeo Calomarde, who being 
minister of justice was able to withhold that com- 
modity from his master's subjects for six or seven 
years. This functionary, if not exactly one of 
Fernando's favourites, was his most trusted and 
powerful minister. He was the typical minion of 
an absolute King — autocracy generally being synony- 
mous with flunkeyocracy. Like Grijalba, Don Tadeo 
rose from the ranks. In his childhood he laboured in 
the fields, but his native wit having attracted remark, 
his poor parents were persuaded to procure him the 
rudiments of an education. From his native village 
of Villel in Aragon, he went at the age of fifteen 
to the University of Zaragoza. England, it must 
be remembered, is the only country where the 
universities are practically barred to the poor. To 
eke out his slender means of livelihood, the young 



28 A Queen at Bay 

student found employment as page to a man of 
wealth. The story goes that one night, while 
lighting his master's friends to their homes, he was 
asked what he meant to become as a result of his 
studies, and gave the unexpected and prophetic 
answer, "Minister of justice." The next stage in 
Calomarde's career was less creditable. Having been 
called to the bar, he went to try his fortunes at 
Madrid, furnished with a letter of introduction to 
Don Antonio Beltran, medical adviser to the all- 
powerful favourite Godoy. Like the judge im- 
mortalized by Gilbert, he presently professed his love 
for the doctor's elderly, ugly daughter, and reaped 
the reward of his enterprise by being appointed to 
a lucrative post in the Colonial Office. But when, 
like the hero of the song, he proposed to throw over 
his patron's daughter, Godoy intervened, and offered 
him the alternative of marriage or the galleys. The 
rising young civil servant chose the lady, but 
promptly left her upon the favourite's downfall, two 
months later. The discarded wife retired to Zara- 
goza, and so far from cherishing resentment against 
her husband, bequeathed her fortune to him when 
she died many years later. At the time of the first 
French invasion, Calomarde accompanied the govern- 
ment to Cadiz, and in the troubled years that 
followed rendered himself notorious by his attach- 
ment to the Absolutist ; party. During Fernando's 
captivity at Cadiz, he acted as secretary to the 
caucus at Madrid which it suited Angouleme to 



The Infanta Isabel 29 

style a regency. His protestations of devotion to 
the Crown attracted the notice of the King, who 
rewarded him with the very office he had coveted 
in his youth. The two men understood each other 
thoroughly. Both were sceptics and cynics without 
any faith in the ideas which served as the surest 
foundation of their power, and which they knew 
how to exploit and to make use of in others. 
Fernando knew very well that it paid Calomarde to 
serve him ; Calomarde knew that he must serve the 
King faithfully to further his own personal ends. 
He anticipated his master's wishes, looked at things 
from his standpoint, and was, in short, his tool and 
confidant, without ever becoming his ruler. Know- 
ing that men like himself flourish best in the shadow 
of the throne, he was the bitter and relentless foe of 
the Liberals, and was thus believed by the Apostolics 
to be one of themselves. In this way he became 
aware of their aspirations and plots, which he 
promptly revealed to his master. So long as 
Fernando lived, he was Fernando's man ; but as 
tyrants happily are not immortal, the astute minister 
thought to make provision for his future by secretly 
espousing the cause of Don Carlos. 

He was, therefore, not a little concerned when 
one morning Sefior Grijalba brought him a private 
message from the King, directing him to return the 
unpublished decree of 1789, which had remained in 
his custody since the death of Queen Isabel. Calo- 
marde knew what this meant, but with a heavy heart 



30 A Queen at Bay 

he drew the thirty-years-old document from its 
pigeon-hole and sent it to the King. Twelve days 
passed, during which the minister had time to consider 
his attitude and, if he thought proper, to warn Carlos 
of the impending blow ; at the end of this time, the 
paper was delivered to him, with the fateful words 
written by the King's own hand in the margin : 
Publique se (Let it be published). Calomarde would 
have us beheve that he remonstrated with Fernando 
before obeying this command. It is very unlikely 
that he dared as much. His policy was to humour 
his master, and to keep on the winning side. It 
would, too, have been impolitic to have antagonized 
Cristina at this juncture, for if her child were a son, 
he would, according to either law of succession, be 
heir to the throne of Spain. 

On March 29, 1830, then, Madrid was thrown into 
excitement by the proclamation by the heralds in all 
the public places of the city, to the sound of drums 
and trumpets, of *' the pragmatic sanction decreed by 
King Carlos IV. at the petition of the Cortes of 1789, 
establishing the regular succession to the throne." The 
law as it existed prior to 17 13 was restored. Rain 
fell heavily, but it was not needed to damp the spirits 
of the Apostolic party. The best they could hope 
for now was that the expected heir might be as bad 
a tyrant as his father or as black a bigot as his 
uncle, which was not, indeed, likely. There were 
many glum faces in the palace that day, and the 
ultra-royalists, complaining loudly, quite forgot the 



The Infanta Isabel 31 

reverence due to an anointed King. Their indigna- 
tion was shared by crowned heads themselves. 
Cristina's father, the King of the Two Sicilies, 
protested against the revocation of the act of 
Felipe v., preferring, apparently, his own extremely 
remote chance of the succession under that settle- 
ment to the positive advantage of his grandchild. 
Charles X. of France, and Louis Philippe also, 
addressed expostulations to Fernando, though, as 
the Treaty of Utrecht forbade the union at any 
time of France and Spain under one head, these 
august persons cannot be said to have been losers 
by the change. 

Oddly enough, the person most interested kept 
silence. Carlos probably argued that if the little 
stranger proved to be a boy, any protest would 
not only be vain, but would expose him to the 
enmity of the future King. This attitude is under- 
standable, but not consistent with his subsequent 
affirmations of the unalterable character of the 
settlement of 17 13. It might even lead us to 
suspect that the Prince was interested in the great 
principles of legitimacy only so far as they concerned 
him personally. 

Immense was the jubilation of the anti-Carlist 
faction in the palace — irrepressible the exultation of 
the Infanta Luisa Carlota. The affront by the 
bay of Cadiz was amply avenged. The rancour 
between the Neapolitan and Portuguese Princesses 
was intensified. Fernando, meanwhile, seemed to 



32 A Queen at Bay 

be fascinated by his new wife. He consulted her 
on affairs of state, for which, indeed, he began to 
lose some of his ancient zest, so lover-like was 
his new mood. Recognizing the strength of the 
forces still arrayed behind Don Carlos, the Queen 
sedulously strove to increase her popularity. She 
persuaded her spouse to drive out with her, un- 
attended by guards, and they frequently alighted 
to walk up and down among the people. This 
display of confidence induced the magnanimous 
Madrilenos to forgive the Queen's manifest want 
of pleasure in bull-fights. Her influence it was 
that caused the garrotte to be substituted for hanging 
as a means of execution — an innovation which can- 
not be regarded as a very liberal concession to the 
demands of humanity. 

Cristina would have gone further in her policy 
of conciliation had she dared, but her wild-beast 
of a husband was not to be tamed rapidly. The 
Liberals grew more impatient of these half-measures 
— of the Queen's dulcijic a clones^ as Galdos terms 
them. When the Revolution of July broke like 
a thunder-clap, and made every monarch in old 
Europe put his hands to his brow to feel if his 
crown was still there, the exiles beyond the Pyrenees 
determined to strike a blow for Spanish freedom. 
Armed bands crossed the frontier and descended 
upon the coast at many points — in all cases to 
meet with failure ; but the cannon thunder heard 
in Madrid on the morning of Sunday, October lo, 



The Infanta Isabel 33 

boded no good to the champions of the old order. 
Without waiting to count the number of guns, an 
immense crowd rushed to the palace. It had been 
arranged that if the expected child were a prince, 
the royal standard should be hoisted ; if a princess, 
a white flag. The anxious thousands waited in 
breathless suspense while the ball of bunting was 
run up the mast. The cord was jerked — the ball 
unrolled — the flag was white. 

'* Alas ! poor Spain ! " was the exclamation of 
many far-seeing spectators. 

Within the palace all that morning had waited the 
members of the royal family, the ambassadors, the 
most highly placed grandees, the ministers and high 
officials, and the representatives of the Council of 
Castille. A few minutes after two o'clock, the faint cry 
of a child was heard in the Queen's apartment. The 
door opened, and the nurse entered, bearing a naked 
infant upon a silver plate. " What is it .^^ " asked the 
King of the physicians that followed. " A robust 
Infanta, Sire," was the reply. Fernando's expression 
revealed his bitter disappointment ; a gleam of 
triumph, a ray of hope, passed over the faces of 
the partisans of Carlos. The King at once recovered 
his composure, and according to custom declared 
the child to be his daughter. Princess of Asturias, 
and heiress of his crown. The day after, with 
all possible pomp and ceremony, the infant was 
baptized by the name of Isabel, in memory of 
the Queen who had expelled the Moslem and 

3 



34 A Queen at Bay 

made Spain a nation. The reign of the second 
Isabel was to be less fortunate for herself and her 
kingdom. 

The terms of the pragmatic sanction were precise, 
but the hopes of the Carlist faction revived on 
learning the sex of Fernando*s child. The Infante, 
however, did not think the moment had yet come 
for a formal protest. His apparent acquiescence 
perplexed and discouraged some of his partisans. 
Calomarde, for one, affected to give his adhesion 
to the baby Princess, and was rewarded with the 
Order of the Golden Fleece, and by the father of 
Cristina with the dukedom of Sant' Isabella. His 
action disgusted the ApostoHcs. The King and his 
ministers, however, had little time for court intrigues 
throughout the year 1831. Spain shook with 
alarums and excursions. The Liberals received 
some measure of passive support from the new 
French government so long as Fernando refused 
to recognize it ; but when he bowed to the in- 
evitable and greeted Louis Philippe as King, they 
were abandoned to their fate and butchered without 
mercy. These repeated and abortive attacks on the 
absolute monarchy only strengthened the hands of 
the extremists, and rendered moderate men objects 
of contempt and suspicion. Cristina saw that the 
champions of the existing order could not be alienated 
from Don Carlos, and that they regarded her child 
as an interloper. She dared not, on the other hand, 
make a bid for the support of the broken and 



The Infanta Isabel 35 

persecuted Liberals. Moreover, it is obviously 
absurd to attempt to identify a child not twelve 
months old with any principle of government. 
Whatever pledges the mother might give to any 
party, the daughter would be free to repudiate. 
Yet the tacit hostility of the Apostolics, more especi- 
ally of their leaders the Portuguese Princesses, stirred 
the young Queen to action. She determined to 
create a third party. Grijalba, she could reckon 
upon, and also upon Salmon, the president of 
the council of ministers. Calomarde she believed 
she could trust. In Joaquin Abarca, the absentee 
Bishop of Leon, she recognized an uncom- 
promising antagonist. But shaven courtiers such 
as he she could despise if she could gain over the 
army. On her child's first birthday, she publicly 
presented five generals with colours worked by her 
own hands, addressing them in these words : '' On 
this day so grateful to my heart, I give you a 
proof of my esteem by placing in your hands 
these banners, which I am sure you will never let 
fall ; and I am persuaded that you will always de- 
fend them with the traditional valour of Spaniards, 
in maintaining the rights of Fernando VIL, your 
King and my beloved spouse, and of all his 
descendants." 

The last word was significant and emphatic. To 
the trust reposed in it the army did not in the 
long run prove unfaithful, though Cristina's words 
expressed a confidence she was far from feeling. 



36 A Queen at Bay 

The birth to her of a second daughter — the Infanta 
Maria Luisa — on January 20, 1832, left the 
situation practically unchanged. The point at 
issue remained the eligibility of women to wear 
the crown of Spain. 



CHAPTER III 

CARLOS AND LUISA CARLOTA 

THE events of the year 1831 threw Fernando 
once more into the arms of the reactionaries. 
Don Carlos and his supporters recovered some of 
the ground they had lost in the twenties, and time- 
servers like Calomarde began to ask themselves if the 
repeal of the Salic law was, after all, to be taken as 
final. Fernando VII. had issued so many decrees 
and annulled so many, had sworn to so many oaths 
and broken them all, that no decision of his could 
be regarded as irrevocable. The only prerogative 
he could be trusted to preserve unimpaired to his 
dying day was that of changing his mind. When 
Salmon died about the time of the birth of Cristina's 
second child, Calomarde succeeded in getting the 
Conde de Alcudia, a secret Carlist like himself, 
appointed to the vacant office. The Infante him- 
self quietly bided his time — probably not so much 
from policy as from that Spanish fatalism which 
he possessed to a remarkable degree. The moment 
would come — presently. He positively refused to 
take any political action while his brother lived. 
The men of the royal family steadily ignored the 

37 



38 A Queen at Bay 

dynastic question, and so preserved an appearance 
of harmony. Not so the women. Cristina as 
Queen and as the mother of two infant children 
was raised above the arena of actual conflict, but 
her interests were strenuously maintained against 
the Portuguese faction by her pugnacious sister. 
" I wish those women would tear each other's 
hair and finish with each other, like the manolas 
of Lavapies," remarked the King. Luisa Carlota 
achieved a second success in the spring of 1832. 
She brought about a match between Maria Amalia, 
another of her sisters, and the young Infante 
Sebastian, the only son of her detested rival. 
Dona Maria Teresa, the Princess of Beira. She 
was now disposed to regard the victory as won. 
The Pragmatic Sanction had been promulgated with 
every formality that could make it binding, and 
her niece was undoubted heiress of the Spains. Don 
Francisco de Paula, tired probably of these incessant 
palace intrigues, profited by his wife's confidence to 
leave Madrid. With his whole family he set off 
to visit his stud farms in the neighbourhood of 
Cadiz. 

The partisans of Carlos rejoiced exceedingly at 
the Princess's departure. In her they had long 
ago recognized their most redoubtable antagonist, 
and the state of the King's health encouraged them 
to renew their activities. In July took place the 
customary exodus of the court to San Ildefonso 
de la Granja — one of those colourable imitations of 



Carlos and Luisa Carlota 39 

Versailles which the Bourbons and their German 
admirers have run up in so many parts of Europe. 
All the members of the royal family accompanied 
the King, except Don Francisco and his household. 
On the way the royal coach broke down. Fernando 
received a severe shock, and a few days later was 
found insensible in the chapel. Upon his resuscita- 
tion, it was found that the gout had attacked his 
stomach. The Carlists became profoundly inter- 
ested. Cristina, odd as it may seem, really cared 
for her worthless husband, and in her solicitude 
gave no more thought to her enemies' designs. In 
September the King lapsed into a coma, which 
continued so long that the physicians pronounced 
him to be dead. The news was at once communi- 
cated to the Corps Diplomatique ; the funeral coaches 
and paraphernalia were ordered to be brought from 
the Escorial ; but before even the Carlists, eager 
though they were, could move, the medical men 
announced that the King showed signs of returning 
animation. For an hour or more it seemed that 
every one's breathing in the palace was suspended. 
Then came the bulletin that his Majesty had re- 
covered his faculties and would be able to attend, 
a few days later, to public business. But to the 
members of the royal family and the ministers, 
the physicians frankly said that this was a mere 
rally ; that the recovery of the King was out of 
the question. 

Her brief foretaste of widowhood and the alternate 



40 A Queen at Bay- 

hopes and fears of the last few days seem to have 
thrown the young Queen off her balance. If she 
summoned her sister to her side at this crisis, the 
message was never delivered. Cristina turned to 
Calomarde, and communicated to him her misgivings 
as to the future. The minister affected sympathy, 
and did his utmost to aggravate her anxiety. He 
recommended her to come to an understanding 
with Don Carlos. To this Cristina delightedly 
consented. She approached the King, who decided 
to associate his brother with his wife in the direction 
of affairs during his illness. Alcudia was chosen 
to notify the royal wishes to Don Carlos. The 
Prince replied that he could not dream of taking 
an active part in the government during the reign 
of his august brother. Presently the minister 
returned with a new proposal from the King. The 
Infante was to act as joint regent with the Queen, 
and his son was to wed the Infanta Isabel. Carlos 
realized: that the moment had come to show his 
hand. He declared he would be a party to no 
arrangements which could imply the abandonment 
of his rights, or those of any member of his family, 
to the crown. Should it be necessary to. appeal to 
arms he would, do so, and the issue, he thought, 
could not long be doubtful. 

This haughty reply produced consternation in the 
sick-room. Calomarde, Alcudia, and that vulpine 
prelate, the Bishop of Leon, simulated the deepest 
dejection and the liveliest apprehensions for the fate 



Carlos and Luisa Carlota 41 

of the Queen and infant Princess, and of the whole 
kingdom. No one recommended the instant arrest 
of a Prince who avowed his intention of upsetting 
the King's dispositions by force of arms if needs 
were. Instead, the Bishop dwelt on the responsibility 
of a monarch who exposed his country to the risk 
of a civil war — an admonition that might with 
more propriety have been addressed to Don Carlos. 
Calomarde and Alcudia, leaving his lordship to 
work on the dying man's conscience (more correctly, 
his fears), entertained Cristina with the gloomiest 
prognostications. They professed to regard a 
bloody civil war as certain — the Infante's triumph 
as inevitable. '' No quiero sangre ! " (I don't want 
bloodshed) cried the weeping Cristina. Her 
terror infected her consort. In a feeble voice he 
asked Alcudia what he ought to do. The minister 
recognized the moment for a frank avowal. " The 
only way, Sire, to avert the catastrophe," he 
replied, *' is to cancel the abrogation of the Salic 
law. This return to the ancient laws of the 
monarchy will destroy the hopes of the revolu- 
tionary party." 

" The happiness of my people," murmured Fer- 
nando, unconsciously lying, " has been the object 
of all my actions. I will take the step you advise, 
since it is essential to preserve peace in Spain. 
Draw up the decree." 

But this Alcudia did not care to do. The duty 
belonged, he represented, to Calomarde, to whom. 



42 A Queen at Bay 

however, he would convey the King's commands. 
There was much silent rejoicing that night in the 
Carlist camp. Calomarde drafted the decree, but 
not wishing to accept the full responsibility for so 
important a measure, he convoked a cabinet council 
to witness its execution. At six o'clock in the 
evening of September i8, the ministers assembled 
round the King's bed. Cristina, pale and resigned, 
was also present. Calomarde then read the rescript, 
which ran as follows : " Wishing to give my people 
another proof of the affection I bear them, I have 
thought proper to rescind the decree known as 
the Pragmatic Sanction of 1789, and to annul all 
the clauses in my will relating to the regency and 
future government of this kingdom. I, the King." 

Fernando signified his approbation of the form 
of this document, which was then presented to 
him for signature. A pen was placed in his hand, 
some say by his wife, some say by the Bishop of 
Leon. The decree, at all events, was signed. It 
was then handed to Calomarde, with the injunction 
to keep it secret till the King was dead. The 
ministers, having thus seen a father deliberately dis- 
inherit his infant child, withdrew from the presence. 
Fernando, it is asserted, was heard to say, " What 
a relief is this to me ! I shall now die with a 
mind at ease." 

It seemed, indeed, that the conspirators had acted 
only in the nick of time ; for while Calomarde 
was making copies of the fateful decree, again the 



Carlos and Luisa Carlota 43 

cry rang through the halls of San Ildefonso that 
the King was dead. The ministers, after Fernando's 
recent resurrection, received this announcement with 
a measure of caution. They did not proceed at once 
to the proclamation of Carlos V., but they judged 
the moment opportune to post written copies of 
the revocation of the Pragmatic Sanction on the 
doors of the palace. The Queen was praying by 
the bedside of her husband. No one, it seemed, 
had any thought for the helpless infant Princess. 
But in the Duke of Alba and the Count of Aranda 
the old flame of Spanish chivalry still burned. 
Having read the decree, they at once sent the bad 
news south to the Infante Francisco. 

The King's repudiation of his daughter's rights 
came as a thunderbolt to Luisa Carlota. But she 
refused to admit defeat. It is a long way — nearly 
four hundred miles — from Cadiz to La Granja, but 
neither the distance nor the apparent finality of 
this new decree for one instant daunted the Princess 
and her spouse. Northwards at once they sped as 
if drawn by greyhounds. The roads were bad 
as only Spanish roads can be ; horses broke down, 
postillions were exhausted, but onward flew the 
Infante's coach, over the scorching expanses of 
Andalucia, through the perilous defiles of the Morena, 
across the sky-rimmed plains of La Mancha. Cor- 
dova was passed — Aranjuez — now the lights of 
Madrid flashed by — now the carriage was racing 
down the break-neck slopes of the Guadarrama. 



44 A Queen at Bay 

Meanwhile they sat, the Prince and Princess, cooped 
up, cramped, and weary ; jolted from side to side, 
sleeping fitfully and painfully, awaking only to 
resume an interminable discussion of the situation 
in every aspect. Forty hours only after their 
departure from their Andalusian home, Don Fran- 
cisco and his wife drove their smoking horses into 
the courtyard of San Ildefonso. 

They were in time ; the standard still floating 
mast-high over the palace proclaimed that the 
King — outvying Lazarus — had come to life a 
second time. (He had very nearly perished at the 
hands of the embalmers.) Luisa Carlota accounted 
the victory already won. She burst upon her sister 
with a torrent of invectives and reproaches. " But 
all was over," pleaded the unhappy Queen ; " the 
decree had been signed and published." The In- 
fanta laughed this plea to scorn. No matter what 
had been done, or who should be against her, this 
thing should be as she wished it. It was in vain 
to talk of reason, of authority, of prudence, or 
even of fact. As well might one have reasoned 
with a tempest. Before Luisa Carlota, one could 
only give way. She summoned Calomarde. He 
came, foolishly enough ! bearing with him, for his 
justification, the King's decree. The Infanta snatched 
the document from him and perused it with kindling 
eyes. The trembhng minister extended his hand to 
recover it. Luisa Carlota tore the paper into shreds, 
struck the man a sounding blow on the ears, and 



Carlos and Luisa Carlota 45 

spurned him with her foot. Before the avalanche 
of insult that followed, Calomarde could only retreat. 
Stammering " Manos blancas no ofienden, Senora " 
(White hands offend not, Madame), he ingloriously 
fled. He learned to rue the day he had presumed 
to thwart the royal Maenad's will. 

Meanwhile the Infante Francisco, finding his 
brother in possession of his faculties, remonstrated 
with him, respectfully but firmly, on this surrender 
of his daughter's rights, persuading him that advan- 
tage had been taken of a lapse on his part into 
semi-consciousness. He represented the conduct of 
the ministers as trickery, as impertinent artifice. 
He adjured the King to vindicate his majesty by 
repudiating the acts these disloyal ministers presumed 
to ascribe to him. What there was of paternal in 
the heart of Fernando revived at these words. Luisa 
Carlota had, moreover, a trump card to play. She 
showed the King a file of French Legitimist news- 
papers, in which, at the time he was thought to 
be dead, the Royalists had freely expressed their 
opinions concerning him. Fernando's rage was 
enkindled against the party which had affected so 
much devotion to him. With a stroke of the pen 
he restored the Pragmatic Sanction. As the bull, 
a while before, in the arena of Madrid, had broken 
down every barrier opposed to him, and scattered 
the multitude like chaff, so had the fury of the 
Infanta overborne all the craft and artifice of her 
enemies. Sheer will-power had triumphed. Before 



46 A Queen at Bay 

night fell on that memorable 22 nd day of September, 
the Infanta Isabel was again heiress to the Crown of 
Spain. 

And so were the destinies of the nation governed 
by the varying moods, the alternations of hope and 
fear, of a sick, semi-conscious man. " Spain," 
according to the constitution of 1812, "was not 
the patrimony of any dynasty or family." It had 
become something less. Fernando disposed of it 
as his personal property. The twelve million 
Spaniards were simply the livestock, and went with"^ 
the estate. For the most part they were quite 
insensible of their degradation. Their attitude of 
mind is common in other monarchical countries 
than Spain. Thus it is that at this day the claims 
of Carlos and Isabel are discussed as if the issue 
were the ownership of a freehold farm. It might 
be supposed that the only person who had a right 
to govern Spain was the person chosen by the 
Spaniards themselves. But this your Legitimist will 
not allow ; he ignores the ruled altogether, and 
talks only of the rights of the ruler. No law, he 
will argue (and here with some show of justice), 
can be retrospective in its effects, as regards the 
rights of individuals. Don Carlos was born a year 
before the first revocation of the Bourbon law in 
1789, and his status as heir to the throne was 
therefore unaffected by that measure. That is 
practically the whole case for the Pretender. The 
Cristino replies that Carlos had not, and could 



Carlos and Luisa Carlota 47 

not have, any rights during his brother's life — 
that he became heir, even under the Salic law, only 
if the reigning sovereign left no male descendant. 
Therefore the Pragmatic Sanction at the worst 
destroyed a merely hypothetical right — in fact, it 
merely dispelled a hope. A great deal more might 
be said on the same side. For instance, the settle- 
ment of Felipe V. may be considered to have 
been set aside when Carlos IV., a native of Italy, 
was allowed unquestioned to mount the throne. 
We never heard that the Infante called his father 
a usurper. It seems plain, moreover, that Fer- 
nando VII. had as much right as his ancestor to 
alter the law of succession. Spain in 1832 was 
certainly a purely despotic state, therefore the will 
of the sovereign for the time being was the supreme 
law. And if that was not so — if Fernando exercised 
his authority unlawfully — what then was the law 
of Spain? Clearly the constitution of 18 12, which 
pronounced women eligible for the throne. The 
Infante's pretensions had no substantial basis in 
law or equity, and they would have found no 
champions outside his own family, had they not 
been from the first identified with the darkest forms 
of clericalism and reaction. 



CHAPTER IV 

THE DEATH OF THE KING 

IN the palace the power of the Apostolics was 
at an end. Whatever hopes remained to them 
must be placed in the sword. Bad man though 
he was, Fernando cleaved to his wife and child. 
Nor could his strong sense of kingship forgive the 
advantage taken of him in a moment of weakness 
by those whom he had always regarded as his tools. 
Calomarde, as Luisa Carlota had foretold, at once 
felt the weight of his displeasure. By royal order 
the minister was thrust into a carriage, and, with 
scant time for preparation, hurried off to his native 
village in Aragon. His career ended where it 
began ; his political orbit was complete. So sym- 
metrical a destiny did not content the fallen 
statesman. He corresponded assiduously with the 
Apostolic leaders, scheming for the recovery of his 
influence, till his intrigues became known to the 
government. His arrest was determined upon. 
But he had still friends at court, and, warned in 
time, contrived to hide himself in the Franciscan 
monastery at Hijar. Thence, disguised as a friar, 
he was able to make his way over the Pyrenees, 

48 



The Death of the King 49 

Later on he offered his services to Don Carlos, 
by whom they were scornfully rejected. Bolder 
men than he were wanted on both sides, at that 
stage. Don Tadeo's ambition now soared in another 
direction. He went to Rome, reckoning on the 
gratitude of the church, with which he had always 
endeavoured to stand well. In 1826, for instance, 
he had looked another way when his Grace of 
Valencia burnt an heretical schoolmaster, named 
Antonio Ripoll. Such services, he thought, entitled 
him to the cardinal's hat. His Holiness thought 
otherwise. Having lost his faith both in pontiffs 
and princes, Calomarde retired to France and settled 
down at Toulouse. There he died in 1842, having 
earned the respect of his neighbours as a philan- 
thropist. Had he combined that character with 
the statesman's, his days might have ended with 
honour. 

His fall involved that of his colleagues. On 
October i, Fernando peremptorily dismissed all his 
ministers. Their portfolios were given to moderate 
men, two — Cafranga and Monet— professing a diluted 
Liberalism. His Majesty had no great faith in 
them, but he knew, as our Charles IL knew, that 
they would not dethrone him to make his brother 
King. Cristina, on the other hand, leaned more 
and more towards the Liberals. Political convictions 
she had none ; she was all her life a frank oppor- 
tunist ; but she belonged to a younger generation 
than her husband and did not share his hatred of 



50 A Queen at Bay 

modern ideas. Free thus from the King's violent 
prejudice, she saw, which he did not, that her 
child's throne must rest on the support of the 
progressive party. This must be conciliated at any 
price. 

Five days later the physicians announced the 
approach of a relapse in Fernando's condition, and 
on the 6th he entrusted the sign manual to his wife. 
Cristina saw that this was a chance not to be lost. 
Without waiting for the arrival of the new Prime 
Minister, Cea Bermudez, whom the King had recalled 
from the embassy in London, she discharged an- 
other bombshell into the reactionary camp by 
issuing a general amnesty to political offenders. This 
ordinance was dated from La Granja, October 15, 
1832. The essential clause was worded as follows : 
" By virtue of the powers conferred on me by my 
beloved consort, and in accordance with his royal 
will, I concede the most general and complete 
amnesty that any monarch has granted up till now, 
to all those who have been hitherto subjected to 
prosecution as political offenders, whatever may 
have been the nature of their offence ; excepting 
from this merciful dispensation, to my great regret^ 
those only who voted the deposition of the King at 
Seville, and those who have headed armed risings 
against his authority. — Cristina." 

^0 my great regret — the introduction of these 
words was a master-stroke of policy. And it was 
doubtless sincere. More almost than the amnesty 



The Death of the King 51 

itself, it encouraged a belief in the Queen's tendency 
towards Liberal views. The return of upwards of 
twelve hundred exiles evoked a chorus of blessings 
on her head from homes in every part of Spain, 
and meant an enormous reinforcement of the 
party opposed to Don Carlos. The amnesty was 
accompanied by a decree reopening the universities, 
and by other measures of minor importance, but 
alike inspired by a humane and progressive spirit. 

The credit of this policy belongs in part to 
Cristina's sister and brother-in-law (who, by the 
way, is called by some the Orleans of Spain). 
Grijalba, no doubt, had also some share in preparing 
the King's mind for the change. Nor must we 
altogether refuse to recognize the influence of an- 
other class of advisers. The Queen, like all other 
rulers of Spain, had her own particular camarilla or 
clique. This was composed, as usual, of persons 
of humble origin, for the reason that such people 
were more dependent upon their royal patrons than 
aristocratic favourites would be, and were more 
likely, therefore, to be faithful. In such company, 
too, the sovereign could find relief from the rigid 
formality of court life. One of the most trusted 
of these unofficial counsellors of Cristina was an 
Italian named Ronchi. For an account of him we 
are indebted to Carlist and, therefore, unfriendly 
sources. He is said to have practised as a dentist 
at Tangier. Operating on the Basha's favourite 
dancing girl, he was so unfortunate as to break 



52 A Queen at Bay 

her tooth, and narrowly escaped execution. He 
retrieved his fortunes by marrying the widow of 
the Spanish Consul, and came with her to Madrid, 
where he started in business as a broker and general 
agent. In some way he obtained the entree at 
Court, and insinuated himself into the good graces 
of the Queen, who induced Salmon to nominate 
him to an honorary consulship. He was next 
employed by her Majesty to watch the Bragan^a 
Princesses, and kept careful note of their doings 
and sayings and of the persons in whom they 
appeared to repose confidence. On the occasion 
of the marriage of the young Infante Sebastian 
with Maria Amalia, he was charged with the pur- 
chase of the wedding gifts, and presented them 
himself to the bride at Naples, whence he escorted 
her back to Madrid. He afterwards became an 
honorary adviser to the Treasury, and director of 
the state lottery — a highly remunerative office. He 
appears to have served his mistress faithfully, and 
was probably no worse a man than the titled faineants 
of whom the court was full. 

A more interesting member of her Majesty's 
camarilla was Teresita Valtaren, who seems to have 
been specially detested by the opposite faction. 
*' She was the daughter," says Walton, " of the 
Queen's milliner, and educated in all the little arts 
calculated to gain favour with the inmates of a 
palace, among which flattery was not omitted. 
Under the cover of her mother's business she had 



The Death of the King 53 

access to the best families, and extended her ac- 
quaintance by occasional loans of money to noble 
ladies, whose husbands were either poor or parsi- 
monious. By this means she became initiated into 
the secrets of the haute noblesse^ whose carriages 
were often seen waiting at her door. She married 
a Frenchman, who, tired of her company or not 
approving of her morals, thought proper to leave 
her to herself. Some of the Queen's dresses having 
arrived from Paris, and the mother being unwell, 
the sprightly Teresita tripped off to the palace, to 
exhibit them to the owner, when an altercation 
ensued with one of the sentinels, who refused to 
let her pass. The Queen interfered, and admittance 
was ordered. Some days afterwards, in pursuance 
of a similar errand, she passed the sentinels, and 
unceremoniously penetrated into the apartment of 
the camaristas [ladies-in-waiting], contrary to eti- 
quette. The camarista on duty remonstrated, and 
told her that she was not in her place. A sharp 
altercation ensued, and on hearing the noise, the 
Queen, who happened to be in the next room, came 
out. Seemingly overpowered with this instance of 
condescension, Teresita fainted and appeared much 
indisposed. The Queen ordered a bed to be pre- 
pared for her in the palace, and directed the camarista 
with whom the dispute originated to wait upon her 
and to hand her a basin of broth. The little 
milliner thus came into favour, and afterwards 
attended every day to assist at the Queen's toilette. 



54 A Queen at Bay- 

Through her address and her knowledge of all 
that was passing she gradually became an interesting 
personage." 

Three days after the proclamation of the amnesty, 
a favourable turn in the King's health permitted 
him to return with his court to Madrid. He and 
Cristina were received with some show of enthusiasm, 
and the royal carriage was drawn through the streets 
by a party of young men. The young Queen felt 
safer in the streets of the capital than in the palace. 
The lifeguards — ^that aristocratic corps which did 
duty in the immediate neighbourhood of the 
Sovereign — were, she was well aware, as a body, 
devoted to the Infante Carlos. One of the captains, 
the son of the Marques de Albadete, refused to join 
a masonic lodge which had adopted the name of 
Cristina, declaring that he preferred death to dis- 
honour — a melodramatic and significant reply. The 
whole corps followed his example, excepting five 
officers and twenty-five men. Instead of disbanding 
the regiment, the Queen resolved to separate the 
wheat from the tares ; and here she found a ready 
helper in her faithful Teresita. The quick-witted 
milliner won over a subaltern named Ainat, who was 
accustomed to visit her at her apartments near the 
Plaza del Principe. Presently he persuaded in- 
creasing numbers of his colleagues to accompany 
him in the evenings, when first-rate wine and cigars 
were provided by the hospitable Teresita. Politics 
were of course discussed, and in this way the feeling 



The Death of the King 55 

of the corps was satisfactorily tested. Those well 
affected towards the Queen were sure to receive 
substantial presents, and the others were closely 
watched. A conspiracy in its earliest stages was 
discovered and frustrated, and as many as one 
hundred and fifty of the guards, including fifteen 
officers, were dismissed the service in one day. 
The War Minister wished to suppress the corps 
altogether, but it was found more convenient to 
recruit its strength with men of proved loyalty. 
The royal guards, numbering over six thousand men, 
were purged in like manner. 

The commander of this regiment, the terrible 
Comte d'Espagne, was known to be one of the 
Infante's warmest sympathizers and the Queen's 
most formidable enemies. He was now Captain- 
General of Cataluna. He held that office when 
Washington Irving visited him in 1829. ''He was 
the terror of the Catalans," says the historian of 
New York, " and hated by them as much as he was 
feared. I dined with him, in company of two or 
three English gentlemen, residents of the place, with 
whom he was on familiar terms. In entering his 
palace, I felt that I was entering the abode of a 
tyrant. His appearance was characteristic. He 
was about forty-five years of age, of the middle size, 
but well set and strongly built, and became his 
military dress. His face was rather handsome, his 
demeanour courteous, and at table he became social 
and jocose ; but I thought I could see a lurking 



56 A Queen at Bay 

devil in his eye, and something derisive and hard- 
hearted in his laugh. The EngUsh guests were his 
cronies, and with them, I perceived, his jokes were 
coarse and his humour inclined to buffoonery. At 
that time Maria Cristina was daily expected at 
Barcelona, on her way to Madrid to be married to 
Ferdinand VII. While the Count and his guests 
were seated at table after dinner, enjoying the wine 
and cigars, one of the petty functionaries of the city, 
equivalent to a deputy alderman, was announced. 
The Count winked to the company, and promised 
a scene for their amusement. The city dignitary 
came bustling into the apartment with an air of 
hurried zeal and momentous import, as if about to 
make some great revelation. He had just received 
intelligence, by letter, of the movements of the 
Princess, and the time when she might be expected 
to arrive, and hastened to communicate it at head- 
quarters. There was nothing in the intelligence that 
had not been previously known to the Count, and 
that he had not communicated to us during dinner ; 
but he affected to receive the information with great 
surprise, made the functionary repeat it over and 
over, each time deepening the profundity of his 
attention ; finally he bowed the city oracle quite 
out of the saloon, and almost to the head of the 
staircase, and sent him home swelling with the idea 
that he had communicated a state secret, and fixed 
himself in the favour of the Count. The latter re- 
turned to us, laughing immoderately at the manner 



The Death of the King 57 

in which he had played off the little dignitary, and 
mimicking the voice and manner with which the 
latter had imparted his important nothings. It was 
altogether a high farce, more comic in the acting 
than in the description ; but it was the sportive 
gambolling of a tiger, and I give it to show how 
the tyrant, in his hours of leisure, may play the 
buffoon." 

As he was sure to play the traitor with equal 
success, his removal was determined upon by 
Cristina and her advisers. The task was no light 
one. As his successor was selected Don Manuel 
Llauder, a native of Cataluna, who had greatly dis- 
tinguished himself in the wars against Napoleon 
and latterly against the constitutionalist insurgents. 
Llauder understood the man with whom he had 
to deal. He travelled with lightning-like speed 
from Madrid to Barcelona, escaping an ambuscade 
prepared for him near Martorell only through 
the vigilance of his escort. His arrival astonished 
d'Espagne, who sent word that he was unwell and 
could not receive him with fitting ceremony. This 
was merely an excuse invented to gain time, for 
the very next day the retiring Captain-General drove 
through the streets to his successor's quarters, hoping 
thus to excite a demonstration on his own behalf. 
His appearance certainly did provoke a demonstra- 
tion, but it was of such a hostile character that, for 
his own safety as well as the nation's, Llauder found 
it necessary to confine him in the citadel. Thence 



58 A Queen at Bay 

the Count was deported to the castle of Bellver in 
Mallorca — to make good his escape to France a 
few weeks later. Similar resolution was shown by 
Cristina's government in dealing with other high 
functionaries of doubtful loyalty. Joaquin Abarca, 
the troublesome Bishop of Leon, was dismissed to 
his diocese, to his profound disgust and in spite 
of his most unpastoral protests. He avenged his 
wrongs, the following January, by stirring up an 
insurrection at Leon. This was suppressed by 
General Castanos, and the militant prelate hid him- 
self among the mountains on the Portuguese frontier, 
whence he continued to address inflammatory pro- 
clamations to his long-neglected flock. 

The government against which his lordship so 
energetically protested was not even the faintly 
liberal administration of Cristina, but the system 
of " enlightened despotism " inaugurated by the 
new prime minister, Cea Bermudez, upon his 
arrival from London in the month of November. 
The Apostolics objected to any form of enlightened 
government, even a despotism. On the other hand, 
the liberal elements in the country found little 
encouragement in a minister who seems to have 
regarded Cristina as a hare-brained revolutionary. 
Had Cea been less of a fool, he would have seen 
that the only reliable supporters of the female 
succession were to be found among the constitu- 
tionalists. Instead, he set himself to alienate their 
sympathies, by proclamations in which he made 



The Death of the King 59 

the Queen declare that she was the irreconcilable 
enemy of every religious or political innovation, 
and of all those who dared to advocate any other 
form of government than the monarchy pure and 
simple. Cea Bermudez appears to have had the 
temperament of a policeman rather than of a states- 
man. His duty, as he understood it, was to enforce 
the law as it stood at that moment, without asking 
himself whether it was good or bad, or whether 
its enforcement to-day might not entail its over- 
throw to-morrow. His idea of government pleased 
Fernando, who, though still on a sick-bed, was able 
to follow the march of affairs. With the King's 
sanction, the minister was able to dismiss the two 
most advanced members of the cabinet, Cafranga 
and Monet, and to replace them by men of his 
own school. The Queen's favourite was unlucky 
enough to give offence to one of these new 
functionaries. ''One Sunday," says Walton, *'when 
the galleries were crowded with distinguished persons, 
the Minister of Grace and Justice, Fernandez del 
Pino, issued from the Queen's apartment, and after 
him the light-footed Teresita familiarly calling out, 
* Pino ! Pino 1 ' The grave functionary with his 
portfolio under his arm, and subjected to the gaze 
of the spectators, pressed forward ; but the officious 
milliner, quickening her step and seizing his arm, 
led him back to her mistress's room." 

This may have been one of many similar incidents 
that determined Cea Bermudez to banish Teresita 



6o A Queen at Bay 

from the court. Contemporary English writers, 
with that taste for scandal characteristic of their 
age, attribute her downfall to an amour '* with a 
certain chamberlain, a particular favourite at court,'* 
and assert that an extraordinary scene was disclosed 
when her apartments were invaded at dead of night, 
and she was hurried off to the frontier. She had 
no doubt ended by forfeiting the confidence of the 
Queen, without whose consent the prime minister 
would not have dared to resort to such harsh 
measures. By another account, she had time to 
prepare for her journey, and to write to her husband, 
asking him to meet her at the frontier. She proposed 
to settle with him in the south of France, at a 
chateau she had rented before leaving Madrid from 
one Stefani, a lottery-director. The husband met 
her accordingly at the Hotel Henri at Bayonne, 
but finding that she was escorted by a guardsman, 
whose presence she was unable to explain, he returned 
the way he had come. Teresita proceeded to the 
chateau in one of the finest parts of the Pyrenees, 
but found the place too dull for her taste and 
cancelled the lease. What became of her we can 
only conjecture. Her pockets were well lined (if 
that expression may be safely used regarding a lady), 
and she probably drifted to Paris, which proved 
a happy home under the Empire for Spaniards of 
expensive tastes and doubtful antecedents. 

But at the court of Madrid there were still more 
powerful and mischievous intriguers whom Cea 



The Death of the King 6i 

BermudeZj true to the instincts of a constable, longed 
to apprehend and to expel. Don Jose Diaz Jimenez, 
librarian to Don Carlos, was hauled out of bed and 
thrown into prison, on the charge of being concerned 
in an Apostolic plot. Auguet de St. Sylvain, a 
French Legitimist knight-errant and the Prince's 
most valuable adherent, was sent packing to the 
Portuguese frontier ; and the Conde Negri, another 
Apostolic, was pounced upon and arrested while 
actually playing cards with his Highness. Carlos 
himself refused to depart from his policy of masterly 
inactivity. He looked on with composure while 
an apartment occupied by his suite, formerly ap- 
propriated to the Minister of Justice, was ransacked 
in search of documents designed to defeat his claim 
to the throne. These, giving the opinions of the 
great prelates and law-officers of Spain favourable 
to the Pragmatic Sanction of 1789, were published 
by order of the Queen on New Year's Day, 1833, 
after the King's solemn repudiation of the decree 
of September 18. It seemed that nothing could 
stir the Infante into any overt act of opposition ; 
yet Cristina and the ministers well knew that his 
wife and sister-in-law were the wire-pullers of all 
the Apostolic plots and outbreaks that were troubling 
the country. But it was not the good-natured 
young Queen who first lost patience with these 
determined enemies. Fernando found himself suf- 
ficiently re-established in health to resume the 
government, which he did formally on January 4, 



62 A Queen at Bay 

1833, at the same time ordering a medal to be 
struck " to perpetuate the memory of her Majesty's 
splendid actions." The King felt that his days were 
numbered, and he was anxious before all things to 
make sure the succession of his child. As a 
preliminary precaution he resolved to rid the court 
of his brother's devoted and beloved sister-in-law, 
the so-called Princess of Beira. This august lady's 
husband — an Infante of Spain — had been dead many 
years, and her only son, Don Sebastian, was now 
married and settled. There seemed no reason, 
therefore, why Dona Maria Teresa should not be 
restored to her relatives in Portugal. Fernando 
straightway instructed Cordova, his ambassador at 
Lisbon, to hint to Dom Miguel that his sister might 
like to revisit her native land. The Portuguese 
usurper displayed no great fraternal eagerness, but 
he was desirous of keeping on good terms with his 
fellow-tyrant at Madrid. The Princess, to her 
profound disgust, was accordingly presented at the 
beginning of March with a letter from her brother 
beseeching her to return, accompanied by his Catholic 
Majesty's gracious permission for her to do so at 
once. This intimation produced a painful scene in 
the Carlist household. Dona Maria Teresa did not 
" remember sweet Argos " and had not the smallest 
desire ever to see it again. It is amusing to find 
the King's proceeding qualified by Carlist writers as 
mean and dastardly. The Infante, we are told, 
flew to his Majesty's apartment, protested against 



The Death of the King 63 

the separation, and begged to be allowed to ac- 
company the Princess. This display of attachment 
to a middle-aged sister-in-law startled Fernando, 
and he curtly and cruelly refused his brother's 
prayer. Cea Bermudez, however, hearing what had 
passed, represented to his master the advantage of 
getting Carlos out of Madrid, especially in view of 
the proposed solemn public act of allegiance to the 
Princess Isabel. Cristina seems to have had no 
part whatever in this transaction, though she must 
have been heartily glad to see the last of the 
sanctimonious Carlos and his censorious, ponderous 
womenfolk. For the Prince was removing with 
his whole household. Preparations for departure 
were mournfully going on even in the quarters of 
young Sebastian and his girl-wife, the Queen's sister. 
And to explain matters, Fernando graciously made 
the following announcement in the Gazette of 
March 14 : 

''By a letter addressed to me from Braga on 
the 23rd ult., my august cousin, the King of 
Portugal [sic\ expressed to me his earnest wish 
that the Princess of Beira, his sister, my very dear 
and well-beloved cousin, should return to her family, 
as the guardianship of her son, the Infante Don 
Sebastian, has been terminated by his marriage. I 
have acceded to this request, and the Princess, having 
signified her assent, has fixed her departure for the 
1 6th inst. ; and I have also permitted, at their 
request, the Infantes Don Carlos and Don Sebastian, 



64 A Queen at Bay 

with their families, to accompany her for the space 
of two months. I therefore direct the Captains- 
General of New Castille and Estremadura to take 
all measures essential to the safety and dignity of 
the illustrious travellers, but I forbid, following the 
precedent of my own progress through Cataluna, 
that any honours be rendered to them which may 
disturb public tranquillity or be burdensome to my 
people." 

Conformably to this decree, Carlos on the day 
appointed took leave of his brother and his brother's 
wife, neither of whom he was ever to see again. 
The two men parted with genuine emotion. They 
had been fellow exiles and captives, and had shared 
all the troubles and perils of the last twenty years. 
These, the Infante found, the King had so far 
forgotten as to place at the head of the escort 
Don Vicente Minio, one of the officers deputed by 
the constitutional regency to carry the royal family 
from Seville to Cadiz in 1823. By this man, in 
obedience to the sovereign's command, all attempts 
at demonstrations along the route were sternly 
suppressed ; but, five days after leaving Madrid, the 
princely party reached Elvas in Portugal, whence 
to Lisbon, we are told, their progress was an un- 
interrupted succession of popular ovations. 

The refugees were made very welcome by Dom 
Miguel, who allotted them a delightful residence in 
the Quinta de Ramalhao, in the outskirts of Cintra. 
Carlos was a man after Miguel's own heart, and the 




From a lithograph by Villain 



p. 64] 



DON CARLOS 



\ 



The Death of the King 65 

position of the two was, or was about to become, 
identical. The Portuguese Prince having discovered, 
to the astonishment of historians and jurists, that 
the Salic law prevailed in the House of Bragan^a, 
ousted his brother's daughter, Maria da Gloria, 
from her throne. Those who deny equal rights to 
both sexes always end by denying rights of any 
kind to either, and this usurper proceeded to govern 
Portugal after the methods of Ashanti. But even 
now his ill-gotten throne was rudely shaken, for 
his brother Pedro of Brazil came over to defend 
his daughter's rights and resisted all efforts to dis- 
lodge him and his little army from Oporto. Miguel 
wanted an ally, and saw plainly, which that amazing 
statesman Cea Bermudez did not, that this could 
not be any future Queen of Spain. Fernando, 
every one knew, had not long to live. A common 
cause and a common interest at once united Don 
Carlos and Dom Miguel. 

Don Luis de Cordova, the Spanish ambassador, had 
now the almost impossible task of maintaining the 
friendliest relations between the two courts and at 
the same time detaching the self-styled King of 
Portugal from the Infante. His despatches made 
Fernando think that he would have done better, 
after all, to have kept his brother in sight at Madrid. 
At his command, the ambassador presented himself 
at Ramalhao, in the morning of April 27, and 
asked Don Carlos if it was his intention to acknow- 
ledge the Infanta Isabel as Princess of Asturias and 

5 



66 A Queen at Bay 

to take the oath of allegiance to her at the forth- 
coming assembly of the Cortes. The Prince said 
that he preferred to reply directly to the King, and 
this he did in the following letter : 

" You desire to know if I am prepared to take 
the oath of allegiance to your daughter as Princess 
of Asturias. I need not say how much I wish that 
I could do so — you know that these words come 
from my heart. Nothing could be more agreeable 
to me than to acknowledge your daughter, and so 
to avoid all the annoyance my refusal may occasion 
you. But my conscience and honour will not allow 
it. I possess rights so sacred that I could not divest 
myself of them — rights given me by God when He 
gave me life, which He alone can take from me 
by giving you a son — and that He would do so, 
I wish perhaps more ardently than you do yourself. 
I am called on to uphold, moreover, the rights of 
those that come after me. Therefore I feel bound 
to make the enclosed declaration, which I address 
in the most solemn manner to you and to all other 
sovereigns, to whom, I hope, you will communicate 
it." 

The declaration ran thus : '* I, Carlos Maria 
Isidro de Borbon y Borbon, Infante of Spain, con- 
vinced of my legitimate right to the crown of Spain, 
should I survive and should your Majesty leave no 
son, declare that my conscience and my honour do 
not allow me to take any oath or to acknowledge 



The Death of the King 67 

any rights conflicting therewith. — To our Lord the 
King, his alFectionate brother and faithful vassal, 
" Carlos de Borbon y Borbon." 

Fernando' s reply, moderate and sarcastic in tone, 
but amounting to a sentence of exile, is worth 
quoting almost in extenso. " I have no wish," writes 
the King, '' to do violence to your conscience, nor 
do I hope to persuade you to renounce those pre- 
tended rights, which, though they are founded on 
purely human acts, you believe can only be with- 
drawn from you by God. But my brotherly regard 
impels me to spare you the unpleasantness inevitable 
in a country where your supposed rights are not 
recognized, and my duty as King obliges me to 
remove to a distance a Prince whose pretensions may 
be a pretext for disturbances. I give you licence, 
therefore, to proceed immediately with your family 
to the Papal States, leaving you to advise me as to 
the spot you select for your residence. At the port 
of Lisbon, you will shortly find one of my ships of 
war to transport you. Spain is independent, as 
regards her domestic affairs, of any foreign influence. 
I should be acting against my free and complete 
sovereignty, and violating the principle of non- 
intervention adopted by the Cabinets of Europe, 
if I made the communication desired by you. 
Adieu, my beloved Carlos. Believe me that I have 
always loved you, love you now, and always shall 
love you. — Fernando." 



68 A Queen at Bay 

Despite his reiterated protestations of loyalty and 
obedience, Carlos had not the remotest intention of 
complying with this order. Cintra is a paradise in 
spring and early summer, and it was also an excellent 
vantage-point whence to watch the course of events 
in the neighbouring kingdom. A long corre- 
spondence followed between the brothers, which 
compels our admiration for the patience of the 
King and the nimble evasiveness of the Infante. 
Carlos exhibited a resourcefulness and ingenuity on 
this occasion of which he never gave proof at any 
other time. He is eager to obey his sovereign's 
commands, but alas ! he has no money for the 
journey. The means are promised, but — the plague 
has broken out at Lisbon. He could not expose 
his family to danger by embarking there. He is 
left free to choose another port ; but fears that a 
vessel from any Portuguese port would be kept in 
quarantine by the authorities of the Papal States. 
He expresses a strong desire to see that delightful 
country ; but reminds his brother that the feast of 
Corpus Christi approaches, and his piety obliges him 
to celebrate it at Mafra. On July 24 the troops of 
Dom Miguel evacuated Lisbon, which at once pro- 
claimed Maria da Gloria. Carlos now manifested a 
particular affection for that port, and said he would 
embark there for Italy, as soon as it had been re- 
occupied by the usurper's forces. In a tone of 
injured innocence, he protested, also, against his 
brother's accusations of disobedience by demanding 



The Death of the King 69 

to be tried for any ofFence he might have committed. 
But Fernando had had enough of this interminable 
tergiversation. On August 30 he wrote, com- 
plaining of the Prince's disregard of his repeated 
commands, and concluding with this very precise 
intimation : " I command you, then, immediately 
to choose one of the various means of departure 
specified in my orders, and to communicate, in order 
to avoid further delay, your choice to my envoy, 
Don Luis Fernandez de Cordova, or in his absence, 
Don Antonio Caballero, who has all the instruc- 
tions necessary to its being put into execution. I 
shall regard any excuse or difficulty you may put in 
the way of your selection or journey as an act of 
resistance to my will, and I will show you, as I may 
think proper, that an Infante of Spain is not free to 
disobey his King." 

To this final letter Carlos returned no answer. 
From that hour he was in rebellion against the 
crown of Spain. 

His formal protest had been ignored at the 
solemn recognition by the Cortes of the Infanta 
Isabel as heiress to the throne on June 20. The 
streets of Madrid were lavishly decorated on that 
day, when the King and his family, followed by 
the estates of the realm, went in procession to the 
ancient church of San Geronimo del Prado attached 
to the old Buen Retiro palace. The interior of the 
sacred edifice was hung with priceless tapestries and 
cloth of gold. After the celebration of mass, the 



70 A Queen at Bay 

oath of allegiance was administered to the Princes 
of the blood — Don Francisco de Paula and Don 
Sebastian — by the Archbishop of Granada. His 
reverend brother of Toledo, the Primate of Spain, 
had refused to officiate. The members of the estates 
were sworn by the Duke of Medinaceli. As each 
man swore to bear true and faithful allegiance to 
the Infanta Isabel as rightful and undoubted heiress 
to the throne of Spain, he passed over to the right 
of the altar, did homage to the King and Queen, 
and kissed the hands of the person most deeply 
interested. The little lady wore a plain white frock, 
which contrasted prettily with Cristina's heavy green 
mantle, brocaded with gold and pearls. Fernando, 
racked with pain, but cutting a fine figure in a 
captain-general's uniform, wearily extended his hand 
to be kissed by prelate, prince, grandee, and 
commoner, as they knelt before him, at the summons 
of the king-at-arms. The ceremony had all the 
sombre pomp and clangour of the Middle Ages. 
It was little to the taste of her Royal Highness, 
who tried to wriggle from her nurse's arms, and 
howled loudly when restrained. In vain were 
efforts made to pacify her by the administration of 
lollipops — she was in no wise content. An evil 
omen, thought many of the spectators ; and the 
father remembered his brother's declaration, and the 
protests he had received from the Kings of Naples 
and Sardinia, and gloomily pondered. 

At length it was over, and as the last notes of the 



The Death of the King 71 

Te Deum died away, the glittering cortege began 
to wind once more down the nave. Isabel slept 
peacefully in her cot while Madrid gave itself up 
to rejoicing. The streets were illuminated, largesses 
freely distributed, the theatres opened free. No 
ceremony in Spain is complete without a holocaust 
of horses and oxen, and the Puerta del Sol, trans- 
formed for the occasion into an amphitheatre, 
smoked for three days with the blood of men and 
beasts. The appearance of the royal family was 
greeted with an enthusiasm that must have damped 
the ardour of the friends of Carlos, yet the occasion 
was made use of to circulate freely strongly worded 
tracts in favour of his claim. His daring partisan 
Auguet de St. Sylvain had had the amusing audacity 
to introduce a number of these pamphlets into 
goods lying at Bayonne, consigned to no other 
than the Infanta Luisa Carlota, who thus unwittingly 
did a service to her detested brother-in-law. Some 
of these sheets, written by Fray Negrete, the prior 
of the Franciscans at Bilbao, might have been penned 
by one of our own twentieth-century reactionaries. 
" Every loyal people," says his reverence, " ought 
in all things to conform to the pleasure of the King. 
Loyal subjects must seek to know and to prefer 
the things that please their sovereign, and those 
that do anything displeasing to him are guilty of 
sin, and deserve to be hanged." The friar's fellow 
citizens of the Basque Provinces did so far conform 
to the letter of these admonitions as to proclaim 



72 A Queen at Bay 

the little Infanta at their immemorial and traditional 
congress round the oak of Guernica ; but it was 
clear that they observed the spirit very much better, 
and were all at heart partisans of Don Carlos. In 
Andalucia, the most liberal province of Spain, 
Isabel was acclaimed with genuine enthusiasm and 
delight. The mixed reception of the proclamation 
in different parts of the country, and even in the 
same towns, showed that Spain was on the eve of 
a terrible struggle. 

The King's health rapidly failed after the cere- 
monies of June 20. His public appearances caused 
him agony, and he had to be strapped to the back 
of his seat when driving in his coach. Cristina 
watched over him to the last with the tenderest 
solicitude. *' Never," said he, " did I open my eyes 
without seeing her at my side, and finding in her 
presence and her words relief from pain ; to her I 
owe consolation in affliction and the alleviation of 
my sufferings. Her hand was always ready to 
soothe and to minister." But this unmerited 
devotion could not long postpone the inevitable end, 
or restore the abused and shattered forces. In the 
afternoon of September 29 the King ate as usual, 
and the physicians saw no cause for immediate 
anxiety ; but at a quarter to three he fell into an 
apoplectic seizure, which in five minutes extinguished 
life. He died without having received the sacra- 
ments of the Church. This time there was no 
resurrection. 



The Death of the King 73 

The world went on its course more lightly when 
he was dead. Fernando VII. was the worst King 
that ever ruled in Spain — the latest, and it may be 
hoped the last, of the tyrants of the mediaeval school. 
His was a base-born soul. Apart from his liking 
for his brother Carlos, and the affection he developed, 
near the end, for his devoted wife, his heart seems 
never to have been warmed by a generous sentiment, 
his mind never to have been illumined by a lofty 
thought. He was cruel like most of his race and 
order, and his cruelty was of that meanest sort 
which proceeds from fear and insensibility to all 
others* sufferings but his own. He hated men 
more highly gifted than he, and always regarded 
them with the dull suspicion and dread characteristic 
of some low peasant. For this reason he surrounded 
himself as far as was possible by mean souls, who 
could hope to gain no empire over him. Without 
convictions, principles, or ideas of any sort, he was 
cunning enough to recognize the force of these in 
others, and knew how to exploit purblind fanaticism 
and loyalty to his profit. He had no policy and 
no ability. His strong instinct of self-preservation 
supplied the place of wits, and he had the good 
fortune to deal with a people which was passing 
through a stage of temporary insanity and hysteria. 
He conspired against his father and defamed his 
mother. He grovelled at the feet of his conqueror 
and captor. Napoleon, and craved from him the 
honour of an alliance at the moment his deluded 



74 A Queen at Bay 

subjects were shedding their best blood to shake 
off that conqueror*s yoke and to replace him on the 
throne. On his return to Spain, almost his first 
act was to imprison and to exile those who had 
restored him. For him no pledges were binding, 
no oaths sacred. He betrayed and slaughtered the 
very men — such as Bessieres — he had instigated to 
rise on his behalf. 

''Fernando," says Fernandez de los Rios, '' opened 
the door to 500,000 soldiers of Napoleon ; the 
country, it is calculated, became the grave of 
260,000 Frenchmen ; but with these were buried 
also 250,000 Spaniards. Humanity may then lay 
510,000 victims to the account of this reign ; but 
this is not all. It is estimated that 6,000 persons 
perished on the scaffold for political offences, and 
that 20,000 were exiled on account of their opinions; 
among them, the flower of Spanish wisdom, valour, 
patriotism, and virtue." 

Preceded thus by over half a million human 
sacrifices, Fernando VII., like the cannibal kings 
he so much resembled, went to his unhonoured 
grave. Believers in the divine right of kings and 
in the aristocratic tradition may be able to demon- 
strate the fitness to reign of this mean shambling 
knave of the royal Bourbon blood. 



CHAPTER V 

A PRETENDER ERRANT 

THE prime minister was at work in the cabinet 
allotted to him in the palace, when word was 
brought to him that the King was dead. He was 
not unprepared for such an announcement. He 
straightway sent orders to the chief civil and 
military authorities in Madrid to wait upon him 
instantly. 

They came — Quesada, the officer commanding the 
royal guards, Freire, the Captain-General of New 
Castille, the Chief of Police, and their colleagues. 
When they were gathered together, Cea Bermudez 
appeared and bade them follow him. They passed 
in silence up that splendid staircase which Napoleon 
had mounted more than a score of years before, 
and found themselves in the presence of the weeping 
Queen. "Gentlemen," said the minister, "the King 
is dead. His august widow, who shares our senti- 
ments and our zeal for our country, asks if she 
may count upon your loyalty and the garrison's, 
to maintain order and to fulfil the King's last 
commands ? " 

With one accord they answered " Yes." Carried 

75 



76 A Queen at Bay 

away by enthusiasm for the handsome woman who 
stood weeping before them, they took oath to 
stand by her and her fatherless child, eagerly sub- 
scribing their names to the declaration the minister 
tendered them. All that hot afternoon, officers and 
functionaries came and went, with grave faces and 
set lips ; all night long, the council sat, while the 
candles blazed beside the dead King, and the infant 
Queen slept in her cradle, as oblivious as he. 
When the morning came, Madrid was told that 
Fernando VII. was no more, and that Isabel II. 
reigned in his stead. The mon^nt so long expected 
by the Carlists found them unprepared. In the 
capital they had no leaders and no plans. They 
seem to have expected the crown to drop from 
Fernando's head on to his brother's by the force 
of gravity. Not an hour passed but Cristina, 
praying in the death chamber, expected a whispered 
summons to rise and to defend her daughter's right. 
Her officers' swords lay very loose in their scabbards 
all that day. As tim.e passed, it was seen that there 
would be no struggle — yet. Three days after the 
King's death, his will was made public. It was 
dated June I2, 1830. Cristina was named sole 
regent and governess of the monarchy till her son 
or daughter, the heir to the throne, should have 
completed eighteen years. To advise and to assist 
her, a council was appointed, but she was under 
no obligation whatever to accept its recommenda- 
tions or conclusions. As members of this purely 



A Pretender Errant ^^ 

consultative body, the King designated : Cardinal 
Marco y Catalan, the Marques de Santa Cruz, 
the Duke of Medinaceli, General Castanos, the 
Marques de las Amarillas, Don Jose Maria Puig, 
doyen of the Council of Castille, and Don Francisco 
Javier Caro, of the Council of the Indies ; as 
secretary, the Conde de Ofalia, or in his room, 
Cea Bermudez. All these personages were at the 
capital except the Cardinal, who was at Rome, and 
the Marques de las Amarillas, who was Captain- 
General of Andalucia. The nomination of this 
officer came as a surprise and as evidence of un- 
wonted generosity on the part of the King, for 
it is said that on one occasion he had been unable 
to conceal his disgust at his Majesty's coarseness 
and had exclaimed in his hearing, Qiue bruto es 
ese hombre ! (What a beast that man is !) Both 
the Cardinal and the Marques were summoned now 
to Madrid. Caro was seriously ill and was replaced 
by Don Nicolas Maria Gareli, one of the substitutes 
named in the will itself. 

These counsellors, with one or two exceptions, 
were simply reactionaries and Conservatives who were 
attached to Fernando and his daughter rather than 
to his brother. They clung to the worn-out theory 
of enlightened despotism expounded by Cea Ber- 
mudez, and feared progress more than they did 
Don Carlos. They fancied that the world had not 
changed since the War of the Spanish Succession, 
and that Spaniards were still ready to cut each 



7S A Queen at Bay 

others' throats merely to decide which tyrant was 
to enslave them. In the first week of her widow- 
hood, when pitying grief was struggling with vague 
hopes and thoughts of love, Cristina left the conduct 
of affairs to her counsellors, and it is to their short- 
sightedness that we must attribute the manifesto 
of October 4. In this preposterous document her 
Majesty proclaims her determination to preserve 
intact the royal authority entrusted to her, and 
to maintain religiously the form and fundamental 
laws of the monarchy, without admitting any of 
those specious but dangerous innovations which 
had been fraught with such trouble to the nation. 
" I will transmit," continues the proclamation, " the 
sceptre of the Spains into the hands of the Queen, 
to whom the King has given it, whole and entire, 
without abatement or detriment, as the law itself 
prescribes." In the face of this ominous clause, 
it was impossible to place any faith in the promises 
of social and administrative reform that followed. 
The ardour of the enlightened classes for the cause 
of Isabel II. was chilled. Cea Bermudez in his 
anxiety to prove himself more royalist than Don 
Carlos gave that Prince his chance. 

It can hardly be said that he profited by it. 
Upon the fall of Lisbon, he had retired with Dom 
Miguel to Coimbra, while the brave Auguet de St. 
Sylvain traversed the northern provinces of Spain, 
preparing for the imminent rising. On the day 
that Madrid was startled by the Queen's insensate 



A Pretender Errant 79 

manifesto, Cordova, according to her commands, 
presented himself before Don Carlos and told him 
that Fernando VII. was dead. The Prince suavely- 
extended his hand, which he ordered the minister 
to kiss and to acknowledge him as King of Spain. 
Don Luis replied that he acknowledged no other 
than Isabel II. as his sovereign, and communicated 
to his Highness the Queen Regent's order that 
he should proceed to Italy at once. Carlos in- 
stantly dismissed him, and was now obliged, most 
reluctantly, to admit that the moment for action 
had come. 

He was in no haste to resort to violent measures. 
He wrote in affable terms to Cristina, requesting 
her to pass on the crown without delay, and assur- 
ing her of his protection and goodwill. He wrote 
to Cea Bermudez, confirming him in his office, but 
commanding him to proclaim him King under the 
style of Carlos V. in all the provinces of the king- 
dom. He wrote a great many more letters to 
various high officers and dignitaries, but these 
seldom reached their destination. The prime 
minister angrily replied that he considered the 
Prince a disloyal subject and a rebellious vassal. 
He threatened him with all the rigour of the law if 
he dared to re-enter Spain, and added that he had 
given orders for the sequestration of his property. 
Presently the Pretender learnt that Queen Isabel 
had been recognized by the courts of England and 
France. Though sure of the sympathies of Russia, 



8o A Queen at Bay 

Prussia, and Austria, he knew he could count on no 
material assistance from them. The northern powers 
feared the English fleet. 

To the Infante's little court, composed of a 
handful of Spanish Apostolics and French Legitimist 
knights-errant, soon came the more welcome news 
that the Basques had taken up arms in his behalf 
and that the movement was rapidly spreading 
throughout Northern Spain. Now he had good 
reason to regret not having obeyed his brother's 
commands. He found Portugal a sinking ship 
which he was unable to leave. From the crests of 
the Pyrenees, his friends waved to him welcome and 
encouragement, but he could not reach them. Dom 
Miguel's cause was lost : his dominions grew daily 
more contracted ; scarce could he hold his own in 
the single province of Beira. His rival's fleet 
blockaded the coast, and would have suff^ered none 
of his friends and allies to pass. The Spanish frontier 
was vigilantly watched and patrolled by the troops 
of General Rodil, an oflicer whose devotion to the 
Liberal cause was well known. Sarsfield, the general 
commanding in the province of Leon, on whom 
Carlos had counted, had declared his adhesion to 
the Queen. The Prince had not the audacity of 
that other Pretender Charles, who would have 
crossed his enemy's dominions disguised and alone. 
Instead, the Infante, accompanied by his consort 
and followers, rode up and down the border from 
Marvao to Bragan^a, like a rat in a trap, seeking 



A Pretender Errant 8i 

vainly a safe egress. Encouraged by old Abarca, 
the Bishop, he showed himself near Almeida, escorted 
by fifty officers, to the Spanish troops, hoping they 
would come over to him. They came, indeed, but 
with such hostile intent that he had to take refuge 
in the Portuguese fortress, and so precipitately that 
he lost all his baggage. Rodil boasted that he had 
not left his Highness and his suite a single change 
of linen, and Dona Francisca told her faithful 
Auguet that she possessed literally nothing but the 
clothes she stood up in. 

The situation grew daily more desperate. Cordova, 
indignant at Dom Miguel's recognition of the 
Prince as King of Spain, asked for his passports, 
and a few days later his government declared itself 
to be in a state of war with that usurper. Rodil 
was now free to pursue his quarry on to Portuguese 
soil. The chase grew hot. Negotiations for an 
alliance between England, France, and the Queens 
of Spain and Portugal were pending, and the 
Spanish commander acted in concert with the generals 
of Maria da Gloria. The position was tantalizing. 
In Biscay and Navarre the Pretender's supporters 
had mustered strong, numerous, and hopeful, yet 
here he was, a ragged fugitive, hunted from point 
to point, without the chance of striking a blow for 
his own cause. 

At the beginning of May 1834 he found himself 
with the remnants of Miguel's army in the northern 
part of Alemtejo. The enemy were closing in on 

6 



§2 A Queen at Bay 

all sides. Carlos, or rather his advisers, now pro- 
posed a daring but feasible project to his ally. 
Their army numbered about 16,000 men. Shutting 
himself up with 4,000 of these in the strong fortress 
of Elvas, Miguel was to lend the rest of his forces 
to his uncle and brother-in-law, who would advance 
straight upon Madrid. " There," said the Bishop 
of Leon, *' the crowns both of Spain and Portugal 
will be recovered." " I would do what you ask 
and go with you myself," replied the fallen despot, 
'' if I thought a single company would follow me." 

From the last ditch Carlos was extricated only 
by the address of Auguet de St. Sylvain. Seeing 
that a capitulation was inevitable, that clever 
adventurer boldly presented himself to Admiral 
Parker, commanding the British squadron in the 
Tagus. He brought a letter from his master, re- 
questing a free passage to England for himself and 
his household. The Admiral sent for the English 
minister, and after a prolonged conference, agreed 
in writing to Carlos's request. Auguet galloped 
back to Evora, passing through the enemy's lines, 
and found that Dom Miguel had solicited and 
obtained an armistice of forty- eight hours. On 
May 26, the terms of the capitulation were an- 
nounced. In consideration of an annual pension of 
375,000 francs, the Portuguese Prince renounced 
all claim to the throne and bound himself never 
to return to his country ; an amnesty, with certain 
exceptions, was extended to his followers. No 



A Pretender Errant 83 

reference was made in this convention to the 
Spanish Prince, whom the secretary of our legation, 
Grant, practically took under his protection. A 
second treaty, signed on the same day by Grant 
and the Portuguese commanding officers, guaranteed 
Carlos and his family and suite a free passage from 
Evora to England; the Spanish subjects "com- 
promised in his service '* were to be interned at 
Santarem till they could with safety proceed else- 
where. Four days later the two Pretenders took 
leave of each other. Miguel embarked at Sines, 
and on landing at Genoa promptly disavowed the 
engagements into which he had entered at Evora. 
Carlos, escorted by a squadron of Portuguese lancers, 
proceeded to Aldea Gallega opposite Lisbon, where 
he embarked aboard H.B.M. ship Donegal (74 
guns). The usual salutes were fired by the English 
and French warships in the Tagus, but the 
Portuguese forts were silent. Dom Pedro, the 
father and regent of Maria da Gloria, was, of course, 
the brother of Dona Francisca and the Princess of 
Beira, but he made no effort to visit them. He 
privately offered money to the Princess, however, 
which she refused ; and he suffered his youngest 
sister, the Marqueza de Louie, to dine with the 
refugees aboard the British warship. On June 3, 
the Donegal weighed anchor, and made sail for 
Portsmouth. Carlos had not troubled to secure the 
freedom of his little band of followers, whom he 
left in the most miserable plight. By pledging her 



84 A Queen at Bay 

diamonds the Princess of Beira was able to secure 
passages for Hamburg for some three hundred of 
them. The rest were attacked and maltreated by 
the peasantry on the road to Santarem, where they 
were interned for a time, and then sent on to 
Peniche — the peninsula where the Boer refugees on 
Portuguese soil were afterwards confined. Here 
they languished for years, a prey to hunger, disease, 
and utter destitution. It was stated, only two years 
later, that two-thirds of them had perished. 

Carlos had been transported to England un- 
conditionally. He had renounced nothing and 
promised nothing. Great was the anger of General 
Rodil when he found himself thus cheated of his 
prey. His instructions from Madrid were precise : 
should the Pretender fall into his hands, he was 
to be conveyed to Badajoz, and there confined in 
the citadel, with all the respect due to his rank ; 
should he place himself at the disposal of the 
Portuguese authorities or the representatives of 
England or France, the general was to insist that 
he should be detained till an understanding con- 
cerning him had been arrived at between the four 
governments interested. Unluckily no successor to 
Cordova had been appointed, and Spain was not at 
the moment officially represented at the court of 
Dom Pedro. On hearing of the convention of 
Evora, Rodil from his headquarters near Elvas 
at once despatched one of his officers, Colonel 
Tejeiro, to Lisbon to protest on behalf of his 



A Pretender Errant 85 

government against the Prince being thus suffered to 
escape. The Colonel's remonstrances were unavail- 
ing. The Portuguese minister of war pleaded that 
the Prince had surrendered himself to the English, 
and that a protest against their action could be 
lodged only by a duly accredited diplomatic agent 
of Spain. At the British embassy, Tejeiro was told 
that if Don Carlos took refuge aboard a British 
ship he would not be given up. Intending probably 
to intercept the fugitive by force, the Colonel 
hurried to Aldea Gallega, only to find that his bird 
had flown. 

This ill-timed and wholly unnecessary act of 
generosity on the part of our representatives plunged 
Spain into three bloody civil wars and cost her the 
lives of thousands of her citizens. If Parker and 
Grant seriously suspected the Spanish Government 
of designs on the Infante's life, they could have 
taken him under their protection, and at the same 
time have detained him till he should have been 
obliged to renounce his claims to his niece's throne. 
To protect the wolf from the hunter is one 
thing ; to turn him loose again that he may ravage 
your neighbour's flock, obviously another. Nor 
did we manifest on this occasion those sportsman- 
like qualities which we consider peculiar to us. 
Neither Miguel nor Carlos could have been cornered 
without Rodil's assistance. The Spaniard's gun 
brought down the bird, and the Englishman 
bagged it. 



86 A Queen at Bay 

Cristina had a good friend and devoted servant 
in the Marques de Miraflores, her daughter's am- 
bassador to the court of St. James. He it was 
who had negotiated the Quadruple x^lliance, the 
object of which was to maintain the two girl Queens 
upon their thrones ; and as soon as he heard of 
the Pretender's escape, he protested to Lord 
Palmerston against this evasion of the spirit at least 
of the newly concluded treaty. But nothing could 
be done now. England could not make prisoner 
a man whose safety had been guaranteed by her 
own representatives. Miraflores, on hearing that 
the Donegal had been sighted, hurried down to 
Portsmouth, accompanied by Mr. Backhouse, the 
Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs. Carlos stated 
his readiness to receive him as a grandee of Spain, 
but declined to recognize him in any diplomatic 
character. The Marques, therefore, stayed ashore, 
while Backhouse went aboard and, on behalf of 
Lord Palmerston, congratulated the Prince on his 
safe arrival in England. After an exchange of 
courtesies, the Under-Secretary, in the name of 
his own government and that of Spain, invited 
his Royal Highness to renounce his claim to his 
niece's throne in consideration of an annual pension 
of 30,000 pounds sterling. The envoy might have 
spared himself his trouble. The terms might have 
been imposed at Evora ; to suggest them at Ports- 
mouth was absurd. The proposal simply gave the 
Pretender another opportunity of asserting his claim, 



A Pretender Errant ^7 

and declaring his unalterable belief that his rights 
were inherent in his person and could not be 
alienated. This conception of the identity of the 
right with the individual is appalling : once ad- 
mitted, it would render impossible any abdication 
or renunciation of a position, heritage, function, 
or privilege, however irksome ! Backhouse, M. 
Auguet tells us, retired filled with admiration for 
the Prince's devotion to his own rights, though 
instances of such tenacity on the part of the inter- 
ested persons are not uncommon. 

Miraflores and Backhouse returned discomfited 
to London, on June 13, but Carlos and his family 
— all of them ludicrously bad sailors — did not 
venture to disembark till the i8th. A guard of 
honour was furnished by the Royal Marines, and 
a salute of twenty-one guns announced the landing 
of the party. No official appeared to welcome the 
Prince in the name of the government or the 
municipality, but King William's son, Lord 
Adolphus FitzClarence, and Sir F. Maitland, the 
captain to whom Napoleon surrendered, called at 
his hotel to pay their respects in the course of the 
day. Carlos now found it convenient to assume a 
nominal incognito under the title of the Duke of 
Elizondo. He dismissed the guard of honour, and 
ordered a gratuity of forty pounds to be distributed 
among them. So determined were the authorities 
in their refusal to accord the Infante sovereign rank 
that his baggage was detained at the customs house 



SS A Queen at Bay 

till ordinary duty was paid, and an official from 
the Alien Office applied for a description of his 
person. 

To Auguet de St. Sylvain and William Walton we 
are indebted for a minute account of Carlos^s stay 
in England and subsequent movements. The exiles 
reached London on June 24, and took up their 
quarters at Gloucester Lodge, Canning's old home 
in Kensington Gore. No person of importance 
visited them, except the arch-Tory the Duke of 
Cumberland, and Daniel O'Connell, who seems to 
have met with a rude rebuff. The Prince saw the 
sights, or a few of them, and was particularly 
pleased with a bath heated by steam he saw in the 
house of one of his partisans. The royal children 
spent a good deal of their time at the Zoo, and 
took some lessons in English. Don Carlos ex- 
pressed his admiration for our country, and hoped 
that it would never be ravaged by civil war — a 
wish that came with peculiar appropriateness from 
one who was doing his utmost to fan the flames 
of rebellion in his own fatherland. 

At Portsmouth he had received despatches from 
his partisans in Navarre and Biscay, entreating him 
to join them without wasting a moment. Carlos 
himself, even at Evora, had seen in the means of 
escape offered by England only an opportunity of 
returning to Spain. This is a sufficient commentary 
on the wisdom of our action and our loyalty to 
our allies. Despite the complaisance of our admirals. 



4} 



ik 





p. 88] 



From a liDiograph after Legrand 
DONA FRANCISCA DE ASIS 

WIFE OF DON CARLOS 



A Pretender Errant 89 

however, the Pretender deemed it hardly safe to 
cross to his native land by sea ; even if the English 
looked another way, a sharp look-out would be 
kept by the Queen's cruisers. The journey by 
land was, therefore, decided upon, in spite of the 
misgivings of the Prince's family ; for Auguet 
pointed out that the worst that could befall his 
Highness, if he were intercepted by the French 
police, would be his expulsion across some neutral 
frontier. Louis PhiHppe, argued the devoted 
Legitimist, referring to the arrest of the Duchesse 
de Berry, would not dare to reopen the dungeon of 
Blaye to receive the King of Spain. If the Citizen 
King had seized Don Carlos, however, it may be 
doubted if he would have suffered him to depart 
without giving an undertaking not to trouble Spain 
again. Auguet said nothing about this possibility 
to his master, and busied himself in making arrange- 
ments for the journey. To put the enemy's spies 
off the scent, he spread abroad the report that he 
was about to take ship for Hamburg, where, as we 
know, many Carlist refugees from Portugal had dis- 
embarked, and he sent his passport to the French 
embassy to be vise for that port. Meanwhile he 
had taken into his confidence two merchants from 
Trinidad, one of whom gave him his passport, while 
the other allowed his name to be used in order to 
procure a second. Carlos now feigned illness ; it 
\»as given out that his wife and sister-in-law took 
turns to watch at his bedside. Even the gentle- 



90 A Queen at Bay 

man-in-waiting was deceived. On the appointed day 
(July i) the Infante slipped out, unobserved, and 
drove to a house in Welbeck Street, where Auguet 
was awaiting him. *' We proceeded at once," says 
the gallant Frenchman, " to disguise his Majesty, 
and to begin with, in the most light-hearted way, 
he cut off his moustache, a sacrifice extremely painful 
to a Castilian. The amiable Mme. B. undertook 
to dye his hair, not wishing to let a stranger into 
so important a secret. She acquitted herself of her 
task with nervous grace, and remarked on touching 
the King's hair for the first time, ' We must indeed 
be living in revolutionary times that I should thus 
dare to touch a royal head ! * ' Courage, madame,' 
replied the King affably, and to reassure her gaily 
inquired if she knew how to whiten his locks — 
' though,' he added, * seeing the times in which 
we live, such an art would be useless/ " 

Having taken leave of the Bishop, whose secretary 
had brought over the royal seal from Gloucester 
Lodge, the Pretender and his clever partisan left 
Welbeck Street at midnight, and drove all night to 
Brighton, arriving there at half-past seven in the 
morning. At eight o'clock that evening they 
landed at Dieppe, where they passed the night at 
the Hotel Royal. Next morning they were obliged 
to present themselves in person to have their pass- 
ports examined and vise for Bagneres de Bigorre, 
which place they named as their destination. Their 
identity remained undiscovered, ai^d an hour later 



A Pretender Errant 91 

they were posting towards Paris. Carlos assured 
his companion that he Jiked the gaiety of the 
French better than the stolidity of the English ; 
but his own sense of humour seems to have forsaken 
him when he compared the conduct of the Duchesse 
de Berry with her sister Cristina's, one of whom, 
he said, sacrificed everything that her daughter 
might usurp the throne, while the other hazarded 
her life and liberty to defend in the name of her 
son the cause of legitimacy. Most people would 
have thought that the sisters, in vigorously maintain- 
ing the rights of their respective children against 
Pretenders, exhibited a strong family likeness. 

On reaching Paris after a journey of seventeen 
hours, the travellers alighted at the Hotel Meurice, 
but almost immediately went to lodge in a private 
house, which had been placed at Auguet's disposal 
by an absent friend. Traversing the capital next 
evening, their postchaise pulled up. Auguet looked 
out of the window and saw that Louis Philippe and 
his family were passing. " See," he said to Carlos, 
" here is your august cousin, the King of the French, 
who has come to wish you a pleasant journey ! " 
The Infante stared very hard at the unsuspecting 
King, who acknowledged the attention with a salu- 
tation. The Spaniard laughed. '' My good cousin 
Orleans little thinks I am crossing his dominions 
without his leave," he whispered to Auguet, '* to 
run my sword through his treaty of the Quadruple 
Alliance ! " 



92 A Queen at Bay 

The parchment, however, broke the point of the 
sword. 

On nearing Bayonne, Carlos presented himself to 
a sympathizer, the Marquis de Lalande, with whom 
he concerted measures for crossing the frontier. 
Next morning he drove through the town, accom- 
panied by Auguet and the Marquis and his family. 
About a mile beyond Bayonne on the road to Sarre, 
they found their three guides. The Prince and 
his follower took leave of the Marquis, and, mount- 
ing the horses the guides had brought, set out 
on the last stage of their hazardous journey. They 
were for a moment alarmed by an officer of gen- 
darmerie, who rode in their company as far as 
Sarre ; but he took the Infante to be an Englishman, 
" as every traveller in the south of France was 
thought to be," and also proved himself to be a 
gentleman, " not the least bit like a police officer." 

At six o'clock that evening, Carlos once more 
set foot in the kingdom he claimed as his own. 
At that moment an eagle rose above his head and 
soared towards the south. '' An omen of victory ! " 
cried Auguet. But he forgot that the bird had 
taken wing towards the armies of the Queen. 



CHAPTER VI 

A SECRET MARRIAGE AND OPEN WAR 

CRISTINA of Bourbon was a Latin, and the 
women of her race are able at the call of 
duty to concentrate their affection upon husbands 
old enough to be their grandfathers, or in other 
ways likely to be repugnant to their northern sisters. 
Though slander was always busy with the name of 
Fernando's Queen, it never but once (and then in 
an English Tory magazine) reproached her with 
infidelity as a wife. Pitiable and repulsive as he 
became in the last few months of his life, the King 
was watched over and tended by her with genuine 
devotion. When he died, she mourned for him 
sincerely — she was perhaps the only creature that did 
so ; but she was only twenty-seven years of age and 
she wanted to love and to be beloved. With the 
King's death came an unwonted sense of freedom, 
the freedom that comes to women of her nation 
and order only with widowhood. For the first time 
in her life she tasted liberty ; only now did she 
emerge from the harem. > She ruled fourteen miUion 
souls ; she disposed of an enormous fortune, for 

93 



1 






94 A Queen at Bay 

her late husband had left five million pounds in 
the Bank of England. But with this magnificent 
position, the Regent was not content. She was a 
woman and wished not only for power but love. 

There were many ready to love the Queen of 
Spain, but in the eyes of only one did she read 
love for Cristina de Bourbon. Once when driving 
she let fall her handkerchief. It was picked up by 
a young guardsman who pressed it to his lips and 
thrust it inside his tunic. The lover-like action 
did not escape the Queen's notice. The guardsman 
was a strikingly handsome fellow, about twenty-five 
years of age ; his name, she discovered, was Agustin 
Fernando Munoz. He came of a gentle but im- 
poverished family at Tarancon, where, it is said, 
his father at one time kept a tobacco store. Sus- 
pected of sympathy with Don Carlos, he had escaped 
dismissal from the guards only through his friend- 
ship with Franco, one of Teresita's lovers. The 
Queen found the soldier often in her thoughts. 
Their eyes met (we may believe) on the promenade 
and at levees. Perhaps they read their common 
secret, but while Fernando lived no word was said. 
Now that she was free, Cristina knew that her lover 
was waiting for her summons. Not a day, we may 
be sure, did Munoz ride out beside her but that 
he told himself his hope would now be realized. 
At last the moment came. As the royal carriage 
was driven towards the Buen Retiro palace, a 
white hand beckoned. The guardsman rode up 



A Secret Marriage and Open War 95 

to the window of the coach, and his Queen spoke 
with him. 

It is strange that slander should have assailed 
Cristina, whose conceptions of morality were osten- 
sibly orthodox and conventional. The course she 
now pursued was very different from Catharine of 
Russia's. Either she would not take Munoz merely 
as a lover, or he would not take even the Queen- 
Regent of Spain as a mistress. The man, it should 
be said, was deeply religious. For that matter, 
once he had inspired the Queen with a deep-rooted 
passion, conscientious scruples could only prove 
profitable to him. Whether Cristina did in fact 
endeavour to overcome these scruples, or whether 
she shared them, we do not positively know. In 
the long run, she determined to make the guards- 
man her husband. It could have been no light love 
that prompted her to take this step. According to 
the law of Spain, if the Queen married again without 
the consent of the Cortes, she forfeited the regency. 
If she kept the marriage secret and it were later 
on discovered, all the acts of her government were 
liable to be declared void, and she, moreover, could 
be called upon to refund to the state her enormous 
salary of ^^450,000 a year. During the three months 
that followed Fernando's death, Cristina must have 
been a prey to very painful and conflicting emotions. 
But her passion was too strong to be resisted, and 
she sought an opportunity to execute her momentous 
resolution. 



9^ A Queen at Bay 

On the 1 6th December, to the surprise of her 
household, she announced her determination of pro- 
ceeding to Quita Pesares, a small country seat which 
she owned near La Granja, and a very chill and 
comfortless residence at this time of year. A 
fire had recently occurred there, and she let it be 
thought that she proposed to inquire personally 
as to its cause. She may have had more than 
one motive for the expedition. Fernando, says 
one writer, had iron safes and secret chambers 
at La Granja, of which his widow alone had the 
keys, and the money soon afterwards lodged in 
Munoz's name in the Bank of England may have 
been drawn out of them. She set out, but a heavy 
fall of snow rendered the roads impassable. Not 
to be dissuaded from her project, the Queen ordered 
the way to be cleared, returned to Madrid, and 
next day started once more. She was accompanied 
only by Don Francisco Palafox, her aide-de-camp, 
Carbonell, the gentleman-usher, and by a single 
guardsman — Munoz. She took no women with 
her. On reaching the pass of Novacerrada over 
the Guadarrama Mountains, the coach skidded 
down the ice-bound slope, and had it not collided 
with a timber-waggon, would have fallen into a 
ravine. Cristina alighted, and walked up the pass, 
leaning on Munoz's arm. The circumstance was 
remarked at the time, and it was then, it was 
afterwards supposed, that the two first became 
acquainted. 



A Secret Marriage and Open War 97 

Arrived at Quita Pesares, the Queen bade Palafox 
and the guardsman walk with her in the garden. 
Her Majesty was in good spirits and talked brightly. 
Suddenly she remembered that she had neglected 
to give certain instructions to one of the officers 
of the household. Palafox craved leave to convey 
the message, and went off leaving the Queen with 
Munoz. He probably was tactful enough not to 
return too soon. Cristina and the guardsman 
re-entered the palace affianced wife and husband. 

But to be married secretly was no easy task. 
Munoz applied first to the Bishop of Cuenca, in 
whose see his birthplace lay. In so grave a matter 
the bishop referred him to the Patriarch of the 
Indies. His Eminence was no friend to Cristina, 
and curtly refused to dispense with the formality 
of banns. In this extremity the Queen addressed 
herself to her friend Cardinal Tiberi, and by him 
the necessary license was granted. And at seven 
in the morning, on the 28th December, 1833, ^^^^ 
than three months after King Fernando's death, in 
the presence of only two witnesses, Don Miguel de 
Acabado and the Marques de Herrero, the Queen- 
Regent of Spain was married by the Rev. Antonio 
Marcos Gonzales to the son of the tobacconist of 
Tarancon. 

The love affairs of royal personages never fail 
to excite curiosity, but neither history nor gossip 
has much to say on the relations of Cristina and 
Muiioz. The Queen-Regent of Spain was in a 

7 



98 A Queen at Bay 

position to close men's mouths. She presently 
appointed Don Fernando her chamberlain and 
gentleman-in-waiting — an office created by the late 
King but which hardly seemed essential to the 
convenience of his widow. The courtiers noticed, 
later on, that the new favourite wore his deceased 
Majesty's scarf-pins, l^eople winked and shrugged i 
their shoulders. It was at this time that Cristina 
and Munoz were seen at the Conservatoire of Music 
she had herself founded, by Slidell Mackenzie, an 
officer in the United States navy. He writes : 

" The little theatre was fitted up with great 
neatness, simplicity, and good taste ; the curtain, 
which was very beautiful, represented a scene on 
the Tagus at Aranjuez. The members of the school 
were arranged in front ; the young men rather 
absurdly dressed, in elegantly embroidered coats, 
cocked hats, and swords, and the girls in shawls 
and bonnets ; the hats and bonnets were, however, 
now equally laid aside, and the pupils of both sexes 
wore the Queen's favourite colour, known in Spain 
as the Cristino blue. At the appointed hour the 
clatter of many hoofs in the street, and soon after, 
the clang of sabres and halberds falling on the 
marble pavement of the stairway and galleries, and 
shouts of ' Long live Cristina ! ' mingling with 
the stern orders of the miUtary officers, announced 
the arrival of the Queen. All rose to receive her, 
and she presently entered, accompanied by Don 
Francisco and Don Sebastian, with her two sisters, 



A Secret Marriage and Open War 99 

their wives. As she advanced up the passage to 
her seat, she was received with enthusiastic vivas 
and waving of fans, which she returned with a 
rare grace, and a captivating smile directed to those 
she distinguished. Her height is good, and she is 
extremely well formed, though inclining to become 
large. She was dressed with great simplicity and 
good taste, in black with jet ornaments, and a 
panache in her hair, which was dressed d la Chinoise, 
Though her nose was somewhat large, and, withal, 
slightly retrousse^ yet the style of her face was 
decidedly good, and the effect, enhanced by a sweet 
air of amiability and goodness of heart, was quite 
captivating. She did not take her seat on the 
species of throne, surmounted by a canopy, which 
was placed at one side, but on the front rank of 
benches. The three Princesses were attended by 
their chamberlains, among whom I noticed parti- 
cularly one, on whose arm hung the Queen's pelisse 
of velvet and costly furs ... a very noble-looking 
man, with a classical cast of countenance, and a pale 
complexion, contrasting strongly with his black 
and nicely defined moustache, and a full dark eye 
which, while it reposed languidly within its lids, 
seemed capable of lighting up and kindling with 
excitement and fire. His plain dress of black, 
with no other ornament than the gold key which 
designated his office, corresponded with the simplicity 
and striking character of his whole person. I was 
told that his name was Munoz, whom it was 



100 A Queen at Bay 

impossible not to look on as a most happy fellow, 
to hold an office of the kind about the person of 
so charming a lady. Though the acting was the 
best I had seen in Madrid, I was not sufficiently 
interested in it, not to find a much greater pleasure 
in looking at the Queen. Her head was finely 
shaped, with little ears fitting nicely and tightly 
on either side ; the first pair, indeed, that struck 
me as having any beauty ; then her neck was swan- 
like and faultless, and it so gradually and naturally 
spread out and expanded into such a noble founda- 
tion, increasing at each instant in beauty and charms, 
until it disappeared vexatiously beneath the dress ; 
but above all, when she turned her head, as she 
did from time to time, to notice and to salute the 
ladies about her, her countenance so lit up with 
smiles and became radiant with sweetness and 
amiability, that I could not keep from feeling 
towards her a degree of reverence and enthusiastic 
admiration, which was less a homage to her as a 
Queen, than to her exceeding loveliness as a woman." 
Another contemporary writer, Charles Didier, does 
not speak in such kindly terms of the Regent and 
her favourite. Though he entertained republican 
sympathies, his sense of decorum, oddly enough, 
seems to have been outraged by this intimacy 
between a sovereign and a commoner. He found 
it indecent and absurd that the father and mother 
of Munoz should come to Madrid, and occasionally 
occupy a box at the theatre, opposite to her Majesty; 



A Secret Marriage and Open War loi 

that they should drive in a chariot with three mules 
in the Prado ; that they should visit the Queen 
at the palace, and take leave of her with the words 
Jdios, hija ! (Farewell, daughter.) We see nothing 
very shocking in all this — proofs rather, we might 
consider these incidents, of Cristina's kindliness and 
independence of spirit. Her passion for pleasure 
betrayed her into much more unqueenly courses. 
Following the example of her sister, the Infanta 
Luisa Carlota, she condescended to organize sub- 
scription dances at the mansion of Conde Altamira, 
whose name the tickets bore. At carnival time these 
entertainments took the form of fancy-dress balls, 
to which were invited only persons whose names 
had been submitted to her Majesty. " There never 
was seen," says Didier, *' anything more comical 
than this co-operation of a queen and a grandee of 
Spain to get up cheap dances ; and certainly the 
thing could not have been done at less expense. 
The illustrious partners provided only the music 
and lights ; refreshments were extras, and dear ones 
at that, even if they took the shape only of a glass 
of water. You could smoke in the refreshment 
room, which was the most miserable sort of bar-room 
that can be imagined. Boys in shirtsleeves and 
dirty aprons served the ladies with their fingers, 
and the place reeked with the smell of oil-lamps. 
This voluptuous perfume, mingled with the odour 
of stale tobacco, penetrated like incense into the 
ball-room. The master of the house, who is about 



102 A Queen at Bay- 

four feet tall, and who, they say, married his cook, 
hid himself in a corner, where no one noticed or 
spoke to him. His ancestors, painted by the great 
masters, presided over the ceremony like disdainful 
spectres. 

"As to the Queen, she danced a great deal, in 
spite of her stoutness, and with the first-comer. 
She was dehghtfuUy easy to please. Half a dozen 
decrepit old hidalgos, whose united ages would 
represent from four to five centuries, took dancing 
lessons at the Marquesa V/s to improve their style, 
and I have seen the Queen dance a gallop with a 
diplomatist of full seventy years. What was not 
less edifying was the public familiarity and quite 
conjugal intimacy of the Queen and her favourite, 
Muiioz. If she was dressed as a Napoletana, he 
was dressed as a Napoletano ; if he was Caius, she 
was Caia. 

" At the Altamira ball, Munoz behaved towards 
her as a husband towards his wife. It was he who 
conducted her to her carriage under the eyes of the 
urban militia, who lined the passage and presented 
arms ; he handed her in, he took his seat facing 
her, and the coachman whipped up his horses. 
They got off safely, except for a few jeers from 
the ranks. 

" The urban mihtia policed the mansion ; they 
assisted the door-keeper to collect the tickets and 
to scrutinize the guests ; they lined the corridors, 
the stairs, the antechambers, even the entry* to the 



A Secret Marriage and Open War 103 

ball-room. The moment came when they were 
allowed to take part in the saturnalia : penetrating 
into the hall in solid squads, they enjoyed in turn 
the honour of dancing a waltz or rigadoon with 
the Queen of Spain and the Indies — who, let it 
be admitted, could not refrain from smiling at 
the pretentious capers and twirls of the citizen 
soldiers." 

Cristina was a true Neapolitan, and had, therefore, 
no very strong sense of dignity. The court of 
Spain at this period reminds us of that of Old King 
Cole of joyous memory. The writer just quoted 
assures us that the Queen and her intimates took 
delight in the most extravagant (and we might add, 
childish) buffoonery. A favourite amusement was 
to make one of the pages or scullions fish for a 
piece of money in a basin of soot ; and the more 
he blackened his face, the louder laughed her 
Majesty. She sat up a great part of the night 
playing tresillo ; and as your Neapolitan cannot 
do without Punchinello, so Ronchi was always at 
hand — as grotesque in aspect as his career was 
strange and picaresque. 

They may sneer who will at the Regent's jolUty ; 
I, rather, admire the woman who could not forget 
to laugh amid such dangers and perplexities. The 
Queen was jolly because she was brave. When her 
counsellors quaked, she smiled ; while they were 
pattering their prayers, she was capering about the 
ball-room in the arms of a militiaman. It is easy 



104 A Queen at Bay 

to be grave when you are afraid. As no load could 
oppress Cristina, her heart could not be otherwise 
than light. 

She had cause enough for anxiety. The quiet 
at Madrid following immediately on the death of 
the King and the proclamation of her daughter was 
but the calm before the storm. The first claps of 
thunder were heard at Talavera, but the war-cloud 
burst over Biscay. This and the two other Basque 
provinces (Guipuzcoa and Alava), with the adjoining 
kingdom of Navarra, formed the stronghold of the 
Carlist and Apostolic interest. The Basques were 
afterwards referred to by a Spanish statesman as 
republicans who fought that all other Spaniards 
might be enslaved. Ever since their incorporation 
with the monarchy, they had enjoyed what was, In 
fact, a republican government of their own, subject 
to the overlordship of the King of Spain. The 
Navarrese also boasted their liberties or fueros. As 
a result of the immunities thus secured to certain 
provinces, the burden of defending the vast Spanish 
empire fell almost wholly on the people of the old 
kingdom of Castille and Leon. This was an 
anomaly which Liberals, it was well known, would 
not tolerate much longer. Carlos, on the other 
hand, stood for the old system, intact and unre- 
formed, with its anomalies and abuses. In him the 
Basques and Navarrese shrewdly recognized their 
champion. It was indeed a courageous and con- 
sistent conservatism that maintained liberty in one 



A Secret Marriage and Open War 105 

part of the kingdom and obstinately refused it to 
another. 

The citizens of Bilbao — the busiest port on the 
north coast of Spain — were for the most part staunch 
adherents of the child Queen ; but in the pro- 
vincial assembly the Carlists had a large majority 
and promptly expelled their opponents from the 
council chamber. On the news of Fernando's 
death reaching the province, a swarm of royalist 
volunteers and militia burst into the town, overawed 
the citizens, and, to the firing of shots and clashing 
of steel, proclaimed Carlos V. King of Spain and 
Lord of Biscay. At Vitoria, the capital of the 
province of Alava, a large force of armed peasantry 
was raised by a deputy named Verastegui, and the 
regular garrison was compelled to evacuate the 
district and to retire on San Sebastian. This port 
— the chief town of Guipuzcoa — was held in 
force by the Queen's troops, and its people, like 
those of Bilbao, were liberal in their sympathies. 
The other towns in the three Basque provinces all 
declared, in the first fortnight of October, for the 
Pretender. 

Navarra was fain to follow their example. The 
brand of war was kindled by Santos Ladron, a 
gentleman of the province, who had fought gallantly 
against the French, and with equal valour against 
the friends of liberty in 1821. Since that time, his 
conservative principles had waxed stronger as his 
intellect became weaker. He was partially insane 



io6 A Queen at Bay 

when he gave battle at Los Arcos to a detachment 
from the Queen*s garrison at Pamplona. His force 
was routed, and he was taken prisoner, after an 
heroic resistance. He was tried by a court-martial, 
sentenced to death, and shot in the ditch 6f the 
fortress. He protested when ordered to turn his 
back to his executioners : " However/' he said, " I 
will die as you wish. To call me a traitor will 
not sully my fame ; Santos Ladron has always been 
a gentleman." 

The Carlist chief's wife was at Lodosa when she 
heard of his arrest. She posted off at once towards 
Madrid, in the hope of obtaining his pardon from 
the Queen. At Burgos she learned that she was 
too late. She afterwards married another Carlist 
general, who met with the same fate as the first, 
being shot at Estella by order of his own command- 
ing officer three years later. 

Rebellions are crushed on the field of battle, not 
on the scaffold or by the platoon. The Carlists of 
Navarra were exasperated by the execution of the 
half-crazy Santos Ladron. Nearly fivt hundred 
young men — all good potential soldiers — stole out 
of the town, and went to swell a force that Don 
Benito Eraso had collected in the far-famed pass 
of Roncesvalles. The defenders of "the sombre 
Pampelune " beheld from her girdle of towers the 
watchfires of the Carlist bands burning on every 
height, the flag of rebellion floating over every 
village and steeple. Across the-Ebro, the plains of 



A Secret Marriage and Open War 107 

Castille were scoured by the terrible Parson Merino, 
one of those human tigers that the incessant war- 
fare of the past twenty years had bred in every 
part of Spain. His reverence had found his true 
vocation in consequence of an insult put upon 
him by a detachment of French chasseurs. They 
loaded him with their musical instruments, and 
forced him to carry them many a weary league, as 
though he had been a beast of burthen. Casting 
aside the cassock, he indulged his native ferocity at 
the expense of the invaders, and at a later period, of 
his own liberal countrymen. Fernando VII. made 
much of him and gave him a canonry at Valencia. 
As, however, he lived openly in the coarsest de- 
bauchery, and was accustomed to threaten his fellow 
ecclesiastics with pistols, he was relieved of his 
functions, though continuing to enjoy the stipend 
attached to them. Men of this sort naturally sup- 
port a despotic monarchy, which by its insistence on 
devotion to the throne as the primary duty of man 
inevitably weakens his self-respect and his social 
instincts. Merino did not scruple during Fernando's 
reign to vow fidelity to his daughter ; but the breath 
had no sooner left the King's body than he put 
himself at the head of three or four thousand ex- 
soldiers and brigands and ** pronounced " for 
Carlos V. 

To judge from Auguet's account of the parson, 
much fighting seems to have unhinged his mind. 
" Merino [writes the Frenchman] is not more 



io8 A Queen at Bay 

than fifty-eight years old. He stands only five 
feet two inches high, but for all his apparent 
frailty, is possessed of a vigorous constitution. His 
features are pronounced, his eyes large and deep- 
sunken. No man ever endured fatigue so long 
or so well. He does not smoke, he drinks no 
wine, he eats very little, and sleeps fifteen minutes 
only in the twenty-four hours. While in the field, 
he sleeps only on his horse, or beside it, when it 
remains saddled. His followers have never seen 
Merino sleeping among them. When the sun goes 
down, he halts his troops, and orders them to bivouac 
in a spot he selects ; then, followed by a single 
orderly, he buries himself in a wood three or four 
leagues away, and is seen no more till dawn. 

" Merino has no particular uniform for his men. 
He lets every man dress as he likes, and clothes 
himself almost in rags, wearing a miserable battered 
hat. On entering a town, he is recognized only by 
the beauty of his horse. His arms are the sabre, a 
pair of pistols that he carries in his pockets, and a 
very short blunderbuss. He loads it with sixteen 
to twenty balls at the same time ; the powder he 
places in his saddle wallets. In action, he puts a 
handful of powder in the barrel of his gun, and to 
fire it is obliged to place it under his right arm and 
to hold the end of the barrel by the left hand, to 
break the force of the recoil of this terrible 
weapon. 

" Merino is personally very brave. He is also 



A Secret Marriage and Open War 109 

very lucky, and it is very difficult, if not impossible, 
to take him prisoner. He has always two horses 
with him, the finest and the best groomed perhaps 
in all Castille. They are so well trained that, how- 
ever fast they gallop, they keep pace with each 
other. When Merino feels that the horse he is 
riding is tired, he jumps on to the back of the other 
without slowing up for the space of half a second. 
It is thus that he escaped from the Lusitanos, who 
defeated him at Palenzuela in 1823. 

" The space of forty leagues that intervenes be- 
tween Burgos and Madrid affords him a safe 
asylum. He can pass through every town and 
village, with no more than four followers, without 
running any risk or meeting with any other enemy 
than the troops sent to pursue him, whom he always 
evades.'' 

Every messenger that came galloping into Madrid 
in the first month of the new reign brought tidings 
of a Carlist rising at some fresh point. Cristina set 
her teeth, and nerved herself for a Hfe-and-death 
struggle. A small army was at present stationed on 
the Portuguese frontier, under the command of 
Sarsfield, one of the many Spanish officers of Irish 
parentage. To him the Regent sent orders to 
march at once into the Basque provinces, which 
were now seen to be the focus of the insurrection. 
Sarsfield was half a Carlist at heart, but his word 
was pledged to the Queen, and he set his troops 
in motion. He broke up Merino's bands, and the 



no A Queen at Bay 

fighting parson was glad to find a precarious asylum 
with the Pretender in Portugal. The Queen's 
army passed the Ebro. Vitoria and Bilbao opened 
their gates. The banner of Carlos V. staggered to 
its fall. 

It was seized and uplifted by the strong hands 
of Tomas Zumalacarregui, a native of Guipuzcoa, 
and a colonel of infantry. Now forty-five years 
of age, he could look back on long periods of 
active service against the French and against 
the Constitutionalists in the twenties. When des- 
potism was restored, he was appointed to several 
important posts, and distinguished himself in all 
of them as an able administrator and a drastic 
reformer. As governor of El Ferrol, he ruthlessly 
and fearlessly suppressed a society of brigands, which 
included, as sleeping partners, several of the most 
highly placed persons of the district. When the 
extreme royalists became objects of suspicion to 
the King, he was relieved of his command, in dis- 
regard of his passionate protests. It was this sHght, 
one of his biographers does not scruple to affirm, 
that drove him into the arms of Don Carlos. This 
seems an unfair statement, seeing that his reactionary 
views must have been the cause and not the result 
of his dismissal. Zumalacarregui was not, it must 
however be admitted, insensible to personal con- 
siderations. He had refused to serve his country in 
South America, owing to his dislike of his superior 
officers. Smarting now with a sense of unmerited 



A Secret Marriage and Open War m 

injury, he withdrew with his family to Pamplona. 
The shots that announced the death of Santos 
Ladron were to him the signal to take the field 
against the detested Liberals. Muffled up in a 
cloak, he slipped out of Pamplona, and appeared in 
the Carlist camp at Piedramillera. Eraso, the first 
officer to pronounce for Don Carlos, was at the 
moment a prisoner in France, and Don Francisco 
Iturralde considered himself the chief of the 
Pretender's forces. When his followers elected 
Zumalacarregui to the supreme command, he refused 
to yield it up, and was placed under arrest in con- 
sequence. Presently Eraso himself — escaped from 
France — appeared on the scene, and acquiescing in 
the Basque's assumption of the leadership, compelled 
Iturralde to do the same. These divisions healed, 
the disheartened Carlists were soon conscious of a 
new spirit throughout their ranks. The straggling 
bands came to wear the look of an organized 
military force ; the neatly planned and executed 
capture of the arsenal at Orbaiceta supplied them 
abundantly with the munitions of war ; the Queen's 
troops felt the resistance stiffen before them. Even 
the obtuse Pretender — slow to recognize merit of 
any kind — realized that he had a tower of strength 
in the Basque colonel, and hastened to confirm him 
in the command of his forces. Spain had produced 
one of her few great soldiers, only to be a thorn 
in her side, and nearly to prove her undoing. 
What manner of man he was, we are told 



112 A Queen at Bay 

by one of his most ardent admirers and devoted 
followers — a young English soldier of fortune, 
named Henningsen, who took service under him. 
Zumalacarregui "was at that period in the prime 
of life, and of middle stature ; but on account of 
the great width of his shoulders, his bull-neck, 
and habitual stoop, the effect of which was much 
increased by the zamarra or fur-jacket which he 
always wore, he appeared rather short than otherwise. 
His profile had something of the antique — the lower 
part of the face being formed like that of Napoleon, 
and the whole cast of his features bearing some 
resemblance to the ancient basso-relievos which are 
given us as the likeness of Hannibal. His hair 
was dark without being black ; his moustaches 
joined his whiskers ; and his dark grey eyes over- 
shadowed by strong eyebrows, had a singular rapidity 
and intensity in their gaze — generally they had a 
stern and thoughtful expression ; but when he 
looked about him, his glance seemed in an instant 
to travel over the whole line of a battalion, making 
in that short interval the minutest remarks. He 
was always abrupt and brief in his conversation, 
and habitually severe and stern in his manners ; 
but this might have been the effect of the hardships 
and the perils through which he had passed in his 
arduous struggle and the responsibility he had 
drawn upon himself I have heard from those who 
were well acquainted with him before he became 
the leader of a party, as^ well as from his widow, 








p. 112] 



From a lithograph afler the drawing by A. AJaurin 
ZUMALACARREGUI 



A Secret Marriage and Open War 113 

that he had much changed in temper during the 
last two years of his life. He had always been 
serious, but without those sudden gusts of passion 
to which he was latterly subject ; and also without 
that unbending severity of demeanour, which be- 
came afterwards a striking feature of his character. 
Those who have undergone the painful experience 
of a civil war, will agree with me in thinking that 
the scenes of strife and massacre, the death of his 
partisans, and the imperious necessity of reprisals 
on fellow-countrymen and often on friends, whom 
the virulence of party opinion armed in mortal 
contest ; exposure to innumerable hardships and 
privations, the summer's sun and winter's wind ; 
the sufferings and peril in which his followers were 
constantly placed, and his serious responsibility were 
enough to change considerably, even in a brief space 
of time, Zumalacarregui's nature. It was seldom 
that he gave way to anything like mirth; he oftenest 
indulged in a smile when he led his staff where the 
shot were falling thick and fast around them, and 
he fancied he detected in the countenances of some 
of his followers that they thought the whistling of 
the bullets no pleasant tune. To him fear seemed 
a thing unknown ; and although in the commence- 
ment a bold and daring conduct was necessary to 
gain the affections and confidence of rude partisans, 
he outstripped the bounds of prudence, and com- 
mitted such innumerable acts of rashness, that when 
he received his mortal wound, everybody said it 

8 



114 A Queen at Bay 

was only by a miracle that he escaped so long. 
He has been known to charge at the head of a 
troop of horse, or spurring in a sudden burst 
of passion the white charger which he rode, to 
rally himself the skirmishers and to lead them 
forward. His horse had become such a mark for 
the enemy that all those of a similar colour, mounted 
by officers of his staff, were shot in the course of 
three months, though his own always escaped. It 
is true that on several occasions he chose his 
moment well, and decided more than one victory 
and saved his little army in more than one retreat 
by what seemed an act of hare-brained bravery. 
His costume was invariably the same — the hoina^ 
the round national cap or heret of the province, of 
a bright scarlet, woven of wool to a texture re- 
sembling cloth, without a seam, and stretched out 
by a switch of willow inside ; the zamarra of the 
black skin of the merino lamb, lined with white 
fur, and an edging of red velvet with gilded clasps ; 
grey, and latterly red, trousers,; and the flat heavy 
Spanish spur, with the treble horizontal rowels, 
originally used by the caballeros to ring on the 
pavement when they went through the streets. 
The only ornament he ever wore was the silver 
tassel on his cap. As he rode or walked at the 
head of his column, his staff, about forty or fifty 
officers, following — his battalions threading the moun- 
tain roads as far as the eye could reach, with their 
bright muskets and grotesque accoutrements — the 



A Secret Marriage and Open War 115 

whole presented a scene novel and picturesque. 
The general gave more the idea of an Eastern 
chief than a European general. One might have 
imagined Scanderbeg at the head of his Albanian 
army ; and certes his semi-barbarous followers could 
have been no wilder in appearance than the Carlists 
in the early part of the campaign. To me Zuma- 
lacarregui seemed always like the hero of a bygone 
century. He was of a period remote from our 
own, when the virtues and vices of society were 
marked in a stronger mould — partaking of all the 
stern enthusiasm of the middle ages ; something 
uncommon and energetic in his features seemed to 
indicate a man formed for great and difficult enter- 
prises. You might have fancied him one of those 
chiefs who led the populations of Europe to war 
in the Holy Land ; he possessed the same chivalrous 
courage, unflinching sternness, and disinterested 
fervour which animated those religious zealots who 
found it easier to win heaven with their blood on 
a battle-field than through penitence and prayer." 

His harsh and gloomy temper notwithstanding, 
Zumalacarregui was loved by his men. To them 
he was known as Uncle Thomas (^Tto Tomds). 
Considering his readiness to punish his troops with 
death for trifling infractions of discipline, this de- 
votion may seem unaccountable to us ; but we are 
speaking of a people notorious for their indiff^erence 
to life, and all willing to take it or to forfeit it on 
the most frivolous pretexts. The general, in spite 



ii6 A Queen at Bay 

of his unattractive manner, exercised a strange 
fascination over those with whom he came in 
contact. Henningsen admits that had Carlos aban- 
doned his own cause, he would have remained to 
follow Zumalacarregui. He was, in short, a leader 
who inspired boundless confidence. His shadow it 
was that fell darkest over the cot of the child Queen 
at Madrid. 



CHAPTER VII 

QUEEN AND PARLIAMENT 

CARLOS was too little of a man, Cristina too 
much a woman, to win or to keep a crown. 
The upbringing of royal personages generally appears 
to be intended to stifle their humanity ; but the 
daughters of Francesco I. received little education 
of any sort, and relapsed into mere womanhood as 
soon as their gilded fetters were snapped by death. 
In February 1833 Europe was electrified by the 
disclosure of the marriage of the Duchesse de Berry 
with an Italian nobleman. The Princess's political 
significance at once came to an end. Her sister's 
fate could not warn off Cristina from the quicksands 
of love. Only, she resolved not to be found out. 
But that was to ask too much of herself and of fate. 
The faithful consort of the King of Spain found 
her interests bound up with those of the throne — 
the affairs of the kingdom were her domestic 
concerns. The mother and regent of the Queen of 
Spain was governed by the supreme necessity of 
keeping the crown on the brow of her child. But 
the wife of Agustin Muiioz had for her chief interest 

117 



ii8 A Queen at Bay 

in life — her husband. No longer was she concerned 
only with the maintenance of the dynasty. Queen- 
ship was now only her profession, and was a part 
of, not all, her life. Conjugal love is an egoism 
a deux. Duty's claims are quickly forgotten in the 
beloved's. Cristina's interests were at present in- 
separable from her daughter's, but she was a fond 
and anxious wife, determined to assure her own 
and her husband's future. She had never under- 
stood the meaning of principle — the Bourbons never 
did — and the bold words about transmitting the 
sceptre intact and unimpaired to her daughter had 
been put into her mouth by Cea. She did not wish 
to go on her travels just then. She had her husband 
to consider. She was enormously rich, but she 
wanted more money — for her husband and the 
children that were to be born. Her second marriage 
intensified the woman's defects. She became grasping 
and dishonest. The kingdom, even her daughter, 
began to take a subordinate place in her thoughts* 
Munoz, luckily perhaps, was strangely devoid of 
ambition. He wanted to get through life com- 
fortably and quietly. The dismal ending of Godoy 
was ever before his eyes. Considering the love the 
Regent bore him, his influence must in reality have 
been great ; but he was contented with the substance 
of power and did not want the name. We are very 
well as we are, husband and wife said to each other ; 
Isabelita must be kept on the throne, of course ; 
but we must not sacrifice her interests as well as 



Queen and Parliament 119 

our own by a blind adherence to this or that 
principle. 

These family considerations saved the little 
Queen's crown. The progress of the Carlist rising, 
the lukewarmness of the royal troops, had opened 
men's eyes to the weakness of the government, and 
the haughty manifesto signed by the Regent seemed 
a blast of empty bravado. It was soon answered, 
and by two of the most trusted supporters of the 
direct succession. Quesada, appointed Captain- 
General of Old Castille, announced his assumption 
of office in a proclamation wherein he went out of 
his way to attack the autocratic theories of the 
government and to urge the necessity of re- 
presentative institutions. His colleague Llauder 
followed his example. He told the cabinet that 
their policy could end only in disaster, and that 
neither men nor money would be forthcoming till 
there was liberty in Spain. 

Cea Bermudez was furious at these remonstrances. 
It was not the business of soldiers to dictate to the 
civil power — cedant arma toga. True ; but Cristina 
cared nothing for maxims of government. She 
talked over the generals' manifestos with her husband. 
Would it be safe to disregard them } She listened 
intently. The voice of the country pronounced in 
favour of the captains-general. There were ovations 
to Llauder at Barcelona. There must then be more 
constitution-making. Cristina had realized by this 
time that her daughter wore the crown by favour 



120 A Queen at Bay 

of the liberal party. To antagonize them would be 
to give the crown to Don Carlos. Cea Bermudez 
must go. He accepted his dismissal with ill grace. 
He believed in his system, and also that he was 
the one man needful to the country — a delusion 
common to statesmen. As he handed over the 
seals of office to Cristina, both must have remembered 
that day of the King's death, when but for his wise 
promptitude all might have been lost. 

Constitutions are the bugbears of the Bourbons, 
but since one was necessary, it must be framed so 
as to concede as little as possible while appearing 
to concede much. To launch such a pseudo-con- 
stitution, a pseudo-liberal was wanted. Cristina was 
reminded of Martinez de la Rosa, whose poetry she 
had read with pleasure. Certainly the verses had 
betrayed no striking originality of ideas or force of 
character, but these were not the qualities she 
required in a minister. The days had long gone 
by since the writer had demanded the penalty of 
death for any one who should propose to alter the 
constitution of Cadiz. The fiery democrat of 1814 
had passed a period of exile in England, where the 
neutral tints of our institutions had soothed his 
aesthetic soul. On his return to Spain, he was 
employed by Fernando VII. He had acquired 
English tricks of thought and expression. He was 
heard to say that it is better to put up with a known 
abuse than hazard the possible ills of reform. These 
sentiments restored him to the favour of the great, 



Queen and Parliament 121 

whose houses he exclusively frequented. In the 
country he was still reputed a Liberal, on the strength 
of his youthful performances. This gifted moderate 
society gentleman seemed to her Majesty the very 
man for her purpose. He was summoned to the 
palace, and directed to form a ministry. The Queen 
talked to him about a constitution. Martinez de 
la Rosa was prepared to draft one — with every 
regard, he assured her Majesty, for her royal 
prerogative and dignity. We can imagine that 
Cristina was more specific, and took care to define 
the limits of her prerogative. The minister, having 
received his instructions, set to work. 

For the space of three months, he and his 
colleagues were tremendously busy. They met 
daily behind closed doors, and suffered no whisper 
of their portentous deliberations to reach the out- 
side world. Spain waited patiently for the marvellous 
political monument that should be the result of their 
labours. " The great day," says a Spanish writer, 
'' at last arrived, one morning in April ; Mount 
Sinai re-echoed with the blast of trumpets, and the 
new tables of the law fell from the clouds upon the 
head of Israel." 

Spain is strewn with the shreds of constitutions, 
and we need not waste time in discussing the Royal 
Statute, as the new charter was significantly called. 
It was supposed to be an affirmation and revival 
of the ancient institutions of the country, Martinez 
de la Rosa having heard a great deal in London 



122 A Queen at Bay 

about respect for tradition and the gradual evolution 
of reforms. He had forgotten another saying of 
equal authority, about new wine in old bottles. A 
system that suited Spain in 1300 was not likely 
to suit her five hundred years later. However, 
here was a parliament of two chambers — estates, 
they were called — one, at least, of which was elective, 
and though it had no other right than that of 
petitioning the crown, it seemed to Cristina and 
her advisers that they had conceded all that the 
nation could have hoped for. On May 25 writs 
were sent out for the elections, and the Cortes was 
summoned to assemble in the following July. 

The Queen went into summer quarters at La 
Granja to await the results of what seemed to her 
no doubt a hazardous experiment. It was dan- 
gerous work handling these strange, unknown 
people, whom she saw always afar off. What did 
they think of her ^ What did they really want ? 
Why did so many millions of strange men obey 
her, a woman, and her infant child, while never 
ceasing to grumble and to threaten ? These were 
questions Cristina must have asked herself over and 
over again. If the despot is incomprehensible to 
the people, how much more must the people be 
incomprehensible to the despot, conscious as he 
must be of his frailty and isolation. From the 
height of the throne, the Regent saw the Spanish 
nation like a great sea — one day calm and smiling, 
the next, and for no apparent reason, raging, black, 



Queen and Parliament 123 

and terrible ; but always profound, always inscrutable, 
with undercurrents imperceptible to her. Now, 
in this torrid July, this great ocean of humanity 
seemed to reflect the mood of the sky above. A 
storm was brewing above the earth and on the 
earth. Madrid lay in the grip of the cholera. In 
the streets, in the houses, the people died ; their 
bodies lay in the roadway, for there were not carts 
enough or hands ready to carry them away. A 
dreadful heat and silence oppressed the city. It 
stifled beneath an awful canopy of huge black 
clouds, seeming to descend closer and closer to 
earth. The atmosphere quivered with discharges 
of electricity. Over the vast royal palace the 
sun, as a direful ball of fire, was visible through 
a blood- red cloud. 

The stillness was rent by the discharge of musketry 
and the ringing of bells. Madrid had turned from 
terror to fury. The monks had threatened the 
people with the chastisements of Heaven if they 
forsook Don Carlos. The penalties the holy men 
had invoked, they should be held accountable for. It 
must be they who had brought this scourge upon the 
city. They had poisoned the wells ! Who started 
the rumour it will never be known. The Jesuits 
of San Isidro were the first to perish ; thence the 
crowd rushed to the monasteries of Santo Tomas, 
of La Merced, and of San Francisco, burning, 
slaughtering, pillaging. " Why should all monks be 
cowards?" asked Becket. Those of San Francisco 



124 A Queen at Bay 

were not. They died with arms in their hands, 
defending their hearths and altars. The Spanish 
people had indeed recognized the clergy as the 
ministers of Heaven. 

This tempest of indignation exhausted itself 
almost before the arm of the law could make itself 
felt. The news was brought to Cristina. A new 
tide was flowing — the devout Spanish people hated 
the monks. It was an angry people, too, for the 
moment at any rate. With such there must be 
no sign of fear. With infinite relief, the Queen 
must have congratulated herself that she was not 
born a coward. She would open parliament in 
person. She had to face a worse ordeal even than 
the pestilence and angry populace. Within three 
or four months, she, the Queen-Regent of Spain, 
would become a mother. But she did not flinch. 
On July 24 she drove from La Granja to Madrid. 
Gracious and smiling, she passed through the plague- 
stricken streets, as if death dared not attack the 
ruler of Spain. The courage of the citizens revived 
as they marked her dauntless bearing. She was 
more daring f than they knew. Her form cramped 
and compressed within a panoply of whalebone, she 
stood on the throne, the cynosure of hundreds 
of curious eyes, and read without faltering every 
word of her long speech. Twice she had to run 
the gauntlet of that numerous assembly ; and then, 
at last, sank back in her carriage, to be driven at 
full gallop to La Granja. She had defied exposure, 



Queen and Parliament 125 

the cholera, and the anger of her subjects, and defied 
them successfully. 

The winter approached, and it was time to leave 
the highlands of La Granja. The cholera had 
almost spent its force, but Cristina suddenly mani- 
fested fear of it, and would not return to the capital. 
She shut herself up in the little hunting-lodge of 
El Pardo, a few miles out of the town, and lived 
in the deepest seclusion, surrounding herself with 
a strict sanitary cordon. None were to approach 
her but her confidential servants living in the palace, 
so great was her fear of infection. On the night of 
the 7th November the cry of a child was heard in 
her Majesty's apartment. Cristina had borne Munoz, 
as she had borne Fernando VII., a daughter. A 
discreet dame, Senora Castanedo, was in attendance. 
To her care the little one was confided. She took 
it with her to Segovia, and presently the Queen 
deemed no further precautions against the cholera 
necessary. She appeared once more in public. 
Presently the good people of Segovia began to 
wonder at the luxurious clothing and cradling of 
the baby that had come amongst them. The child 
might have been a princess ! They wondered still 
more when Senora Castanedo took her charge 
to Aranjuez at the moment the Court removed 
thither. Busybodies interested themselves in the 
matter, and said the infant was often taken to 
Quita Pesares, where Cristina and Munoz had 
been seen fondling it. Doubt became certainty. 



126 A Queen at Bay 

The Queen-Regent of Spain was the mother of 
the guardsman's child. 

It is hard to imagine a situation more painful 
for any woman. Cristina was the most conspicuous 
person in all Spain, and in the eyes not only of 
her own subjects but of all Europe she stood 
apparently guilty of unchastity. That she had a 
complete answer to her traducers — that she was the 
lawful wife of her child's father — must have made 
her position the more galling, since she could not, 
or would not, speak. For her silence most people 
condemn her, which, strange to say, I do not. 
Speaking in the terms of orthodox Catholic morality, 
she knew that she was innocent of the " crime " 
imputed to her. That she should have disregarded 
allegations she knew to be unjust is a proof possibly 
of insensibility, certainly of courage ; assuredly it 
was not a sin. In the reprobation meted out to 
her for her so-called shamelessness, we have another 
instance of the persistent confusion of prudence and 
expediency with morality. It is obvious, indeed, 
that only a woman of coarse fibre could have endured 
such a position ; but Cristina did not come of a 
dynasty noted for delicacy of feeling, and the perils 
she was called upon to confront were not calculated 
to , develop the peculiarly feminine qualities. That 
Cristina was not wholly insensible to her position 
is shown by the efforts she made to conceal the 
birth of her children ; but the regency of Spain 
and the maintenance of her daughter on the throne 



Queen and Parliament 127 

were, after all, to be preferred to her good name 
as a woman. A few years more, and she could 
triumphantly clear herself. From another point 
of view her conduct is not so easily defended. 
According to the law of Spain, she had forfeited 
the regency by her second marriage. Therefore, 
she cheated the nation every time she drew her 
salary of ^450,000 per annum. No one can deny 
that Cristina was fond of money and that the salary 
was a consideration ; but in giving up the regency, 
salary or no salary, she would have jeopardized her 
daughter's throne and have been obliged to sacrifice 
the guardianship of her own child. Surely these 
considerations abundantly justified her bold front 
in face of the slanders and gibes of Europe. 

Except for her husband, she was alone. Almost 
immediately after the death of Fernando, the affection 
between her and Luisa Carlota perceptibly cooled. 
It is clear that in some way she disappointed the 
expectations of that fiery Princess or of her husband. 
Probably she proved a less docile instrument than 
they had hoped. Her obvious intimacy with Munoz 
seems to have incensed her sister still more against 
her. So wide became the breach that the two were 
never seen together in public ; nor would they visit 
the same houses. But when the spreading of 
scandalous rumours was traced to the Infanta, the 
Queen intimated that her patience was at an end. 
Their Royal Highnesses took the hint, and retired 
to Paris. Cristina's younger sister also, perhaps 



128 A Queen at Bay 

unwillingly, abandoned her. Her husband, the 
young Infante Sebastian, had subscribed to the 
accession of Isabel II. in the church of San 
Geronimo ; but the threats and entreaties of his 
masterful mother, the Princess of Beira, prevailed 
over his sense of honour. He left the court with 
his young wife and proceeded to Barcelona, intending 
to raise the Catalans in his uncle's favour ; but 
Llauder was too clever for him, and the only sword 
he brought to the Carlist camp was his own. 

These desertions did not dash the Queen's spirits. 
So long as she had her ov/n way she was happy. 
Her husband was submissive, her ministers sym- 
pathetic. Cristina could only love those who obeyed 
her, and could thus minister more easily to her 
pleasures. We must not imagine her a woman 
loving to conquer, or cherishing those weaker than 
herself with a protective instinct ; but as an easy- 
going yet self-willed woman, regarding opposition as 
a bore and everything unconnected with her own 
welfare with apathy. She was capable of affection 
only for those who were the furniture of her 
environment. Her passion for Mufioz differed in 
degree, not in kind, from her regard for her favourite 
cushion. 

It is always pathetic when persons of this tempera- 
ment are called upon to confront perpetual enmities 
and perplexities. We hear them complain. If only 
everybody would do exactly what I want, I'm sure 
there would be no trouble ! Cristina, as we know, 



Queen and Parliament 129 

took her troubles philosophically. When Carlos 
was reported to have escaped from England and 
to have appeared in Navarra, she shrugged her 
shoulders. " Un faccioso de mas ! " (One rebel 
the more !), remarked Martinez de la Rosa, and 
the words represented not only his but his mistress's 
state of mind. Rodil, who now commanded the 
Queen's troops in the north, thought the one rebel 
more worth capturing. He had no better luck 
than in Portugal. In his frantic efforts to run 
the Pretender to earth, he cut up his forces. 
Zumalacarregui was not the man to miss an oppor- 
tunity, and inflicted three smart defeats on the 
Cristino columns. Rodil was superseded in his 
command by Mina, an old hand at guerilla warfare. 
The Carlist chief found himself opposed by one of 
his own kidney. The two were, in fact, so equally 
matched that neither was able to gain any decided 
advantage over the other. And so the year 1834 
wore away, leaving the rebels still an organized 
force in possession of many strong positions, but 
unable to add an inch to their territory or to force 
their adversary back one foot. 

Meanwhile the parUamentary horse began to jib 
and to kick over the traces. Martinez de la Rosa 
found the constitutional bits powerless to restrain 
the unruly team he had brought together. The 
deputies passed with gusto a bill excluding Don 
Carlos and his heirs from the throne, but took 
care at the same time to affirm the principle of 

9 



130 A Queen at Bay 

national sovereignty. When the ministry pro- 
posed to recognize all debts contracted by previous 
governments, there was a loud uproar. Acknow- 
ledge the loan issued by the Absolutist caucus at 
Urgel ? never ! At last by some wonderful financial 
processes — liquidations, consolidations, conversions, 
and so forth — the measure was presented in a more 
acceptable form, and voted by the Cortes. 

The Royal Statute was not working well. When 
the Regent and her daughter appeared in public, 
there were cheers for Isabel II., but as many for 
liberty. In January, the soldiers thought it time 
to manifest their views. Everybody in Madrid 
seems to have known what was going to happen. 
At a masque ball, the final arrangements were con- 
certed. But the air was biting, and Llauder, the 
minister of war, spent the night snugly between 
the blankets. At ^vq o'clock on the morning of 
the 1 8th, the Second Aragon Light Infantry regi- 
ment, commanded by its adjutant, Cardero, took 
possession of the big post-office in the heart of 
the city, placed the guards under arrest, and called 
for the dismissal of the Ministry. The news 
brought the Captain-General, M. de Canterac (a 
Frenchman of Bordeaux), quickly to the spot. 
Furious with anger, he stormed and threatened, 
and in the midst of the mutinous soldiery, tried 
to take Cardero's sword by force. The troops 
cried Fiva la libertadl In his excitement, the 
general shouted Viva el Rey I He was thinking of 



Queen and Parliament 131 

Fernando VII., whose death at the moment he had 
forgotten. The mistake cost him dear. The men 
thought he meant Carlos V. He fell the next 
instant, shot dead. He died, too, unavenged. 
When Llauder appeared on the scene, he opened 
up negotiations with the mutineers. Never was 
rebellion more lightly punished. That afternoon, 
the people of Madrid saw the battalion march 
through the streets, with their arms at the shoulder, 
bayonets fixed and colours flying, on their way 
(as the terms of the capitulation put it) to win 
fresh glory for Spain with the army of the north. 
That was to be all, according to the promise of 
Martinez de la Rosa. But after a while the officers 
were reduced and sent to the islands, and the regi- 
ment broken up and dispersed. 

The affair was over almost before the Queen 
had heard of it, but it soon became evident to 
her that to manage these troublesome Spaniards a 
stronger man than the poet-minister was wanted. 
The cabinet resigned one day in June. Charles Didier, 
the French traveller, met Martinez de la Rosa next 
morning, taking the air on the Prado. They spoke 
of the weather. Meanwhile the Puerta del Sol was 
agitated by rumours. The French ambassador 
went to see the Regent. '* Well," asked Didier, 
" did the Queen say anything about a new 
ministry ? " " The Queen ? — why, no. We spoke 
only about Rubini the singer, whom she says she 
will have here at any price." 



132 A Queen at Bay- 

However, a new minister had to be appointed. 
Her Majesty at last selected the Conde de Toreno, 
who had earned her regard by entertaining her to 
brilliant suppers and balls, and had done good work 
for Spain by bespeaking the aid of England against 
Napoleon. He soon found that he was called upon 
to pilot the ship of state through a revolution. 
On July 5, the people of Zaragoza followed the 
example set by Madrid a year before. They shouted 
for liberty and Isabel II., and set fire to two monas- 
teries, murdering eleven of the inmates. The 
Franciscans at Reus were the next victims. On 
August 5, Barcelona was in insurrection. The 
monks had already felt the fury of the mob, which 
was now directed against Bassa, the governor. At 
first defiant, he yielded to the demands of the 
municipality. His surrender came too late. He 
was butchered without mercy, and his body was 
burnt in the public square. A gypsy tore off the 
corpse's hand, and bit it savagely. 

The flame of revolt spread along the east coast, 
blazed up in Andalucia, leaped up — at once to be ex- 
tinguished — in Madrid. But Spain would be content 
with nothing less than free institutions. Toreno, 
disgusted with the excesses of the insurgents, showed 
fight. He hurried to La Granja, and urged Cristina 
to hold out. Other ministers urged her to give 
in. Villiers, the English ambassador, was known 
to be on the side of the reformers. The Queen 
was not in the least afraid. She came back to 



Queen and Parliament i33 

Madrid, which was seething with revolt, and pre- 
sided over a council at the palace on August 14. 
But, shrewd woman that she was, she perceived 
that the anger of the people was directed against 
the ministers, not against her. The revolutionary 
committees established in the provinces talked of 
freeing her from the tyranny of the cabinet. Her 
Majesty adroitly took advantage of this illusion. 
On September 14, she dismissed Toreno, declaring 
that he had misinterpreted his mandate, and an- 
nounced that she had summoned Juan Alvarez 
Mendizabal to assume the direction of affairs. 

This statesman was a native of Cadiz, of Jewish 
extraction. He had lived thirteen years in England, 
where he had, as he told George Borrow, formed 
some acquaintance with the phraseology of us good 
folks. He had also acquainted himself with the 
ideas of the Manchester School, which he admired 
more than our religious fervour. In the light of 
experience, it is strange to read that he wished 
to encourage speculation and competition, and pre- 
ferred the activity of the brokers of London and 
Amsterdam to the indolence of the agriculturists 
of his native land. He realized, in short, the 
ideal of a large class of our present-day newspaper 
politicians — the business man become statesman. 
Cristina and Munoz also believed in speculation, 
and followed the movements of the Stock Exchange 
with the zest of a country parson. From the new 
minister, they hoped, no doubt, for many valuable 



134 A Queen at Bay 

tips. His usefulness in this respect led the Queen, 
perhaps, to tolerate his radical theories of govern- 
ment. He decreed the liberty of the Press, and 
enforced universal military service. He announced 
his intention of finishing with the Carlists, and in 
the meantime struck them a deadly blow in the 
persons of their allies, the friars. On October ii, 
he suppressed practically all the religious com- 
munities in Spain, selling up their property and 
devoting the proceeds to the partial extinction of 
the national debt. Cristina was not, as we know, 
specially devout, but, in spite of the friars' attach- 
ment to her rival, she felt a certain sympathy for 
them. In her opinion Mendizabal was going alto- 
gether too far. He proposed to extend the franchise, 
and to amend the Royal Statute. Worst of all, he 
troubled himself not at all about the Queen's 
relations with Munoz, and urged her to marry 
Pedro of Portugal. Perhaps he had no suspicion 
that a marriage had already taken place, or perhaps 
he had become imbued in England with the spirit 
of our Royal Marriage Act, and saw no harm in 
bigamy if committed by royal persons. 

As Cristina was about to present Munoz with 
a second pledge of her affections, this proposal 
was particularly ill-timed. She determined to get 
rid of Mendizabal. He had innumerable enemies, 
personal and political, and these, she thought, might 
be brought together so as to form the nucleus of a 
party personally devoted to her. There was Isturiz, 



Queen and Parliament 135 

with whom Mendizabal had fought a duel, and 
Alcala Galiano. Martinez de la Rosa was not to 
be despised — as an auxiliary. The faithful manikin 
Ronchi was employed as go-between. He is called 
by a Spanish writer the godfather of the Moderate 
or Conservative party. Soon the prime minister 
heard strange reports of his parliamentary opponents 
driving back from El Pardo at early hours of the 
morning — that they had been closeted with her 
Majesty far into the night. Constitutional govern- 
ment became a farce, if the sovereign was to inspire 
and to direct the opposition to her own ministers. 
Mendizabal besought the Queen to give up these 
nocturnal interviews and their concomitant cabals. 
Cristina refused to understand him. He tendered 
his resignation. On May 16, the Chamber found a 
Moderate ministry in occupation of the government 
bench. There sat Isturiz, Alcala Galiano, and the 
Duke of Rivas. They were greeted with a storm 
of abuse. The Queen dissolved parliament, com- 
plaining that it had exceeded its authority and 
impeded the work of government. It was plain 
to all men that the Regent would support only 
those ministers who were prepared to further her 
own ends. 



CHAPTER VIII 

WAR AND MEN OF WAR 

CRISTINA had reasonable grounds of dissatis- 
faction with her ministers and generals. The 
former appeared unable to pacify the country (ex- 
cept, as she thought, by endangering her child's 
throne) ; the latter were unable to drive the 
Pretender out of Spain. Even the redoubtable 
Mina threw up the task as one beyond him. He 
resigned his command on April 8. He was suc- 
ceeded by Don Geromino Valdes, an honest man 
and a capable soldier, who had fought well in South 
America. Valdes combined the offices of minister 
of war and commander-in-chief Almost his first 
official act was to sign the convention proposed by 
Lord Eliot, special envoy from our government. 
Till now, all prisoners of war taken by both sides 
had been remorselessly shot. Under this convention, 
signed by the commanders-in-chief of the opposing 
armies, the ordinary usages of civilized warfare came 
into force, the lives of prisoners were spared, and 
exchanges were effected at regular intervals. 

The Cristinos benefited at first by this treaty 

136 



War and Men of War 137 

more than their adversaries, for Valdes proved less 
fortunate than his predecessor. One of his lieu- 
tenants was signally defeated at Guernica by 
Zumalacarregui, who took possession of Trevino 
and other important places. Don Carlos made his 
triumphal entry into the beautiful old town of 
Estella, where he established his court. Espartero, 
with the garrison of Bilbao, hurried up to relieve 
Villafranca de Guipuzcoa, but was intercepted by 
the Carlists on the heights of Descarga, and forced 
to retreat with a loss of nearly 2,000 men. Vergara 
and Tolosa fell into the hands of the victors. The 
Cristinos took refuge under the guns of the principal 
fortresses, and on June 7 Valdes, like Mina and 
Rodil, surrendered his command. 

Madrid took fright. It seemed that no general 
in Spain could resist the invincible Zumalacarregui. 
Martinez de la Rosa bethought him of the Quadruple 
Alliance nominally uniting Spain, England, France, 
and Portugal against the Pretender. If the Queen 
did not invoke the aid of a foreign power, she 
might have to rely upon that of her own people, 
an ally more formidable than her foe. General 
Alava was, therefore, sent to London to sound his 
old brother-in-arms WelUngton, while the armed 
intervention of France was formally invited on 
May 17, 1835. 

It was refused ; and the grounds on which it was 
refused are a proof of the wisdom of the Citizen 
King. " Help the Spaniards from outside, if you 



138 A Queen at Bay 

will," said Louis Philippe, '' but don't let us embark 
in their ship. Once therein, we must take the helm, 
and God knows what will happen. Napoleon failed 
to subdue them, and Louis XVIII. to extricate 
them from their troubles. I know them — uncon- 
querable and unmanageable by foreigners. They 
call on us to-day ; we shall hardly have set foot 
in their country when they will hate us and put 
every obstacle in our way. Let us not employ 
our army in this interminable task ; we shall be 
dragging a cannon-ball at our heels through Europe. 
If the Spaniards can be saved, they themselves are 
the only people that can do it. If we undertake 
to bear the burden, they will hoist it on our 
shoulders, and will then make it impossible for us 
to carry it." 

Palmerston shared the French King's views, and 
indeed told his ambassador that France must not 
reckon on the co-operation of England if she acceded 
to Spain's request. The refusal was a bitter dis- 
appointment to Cristina. She had hoped to dispose 
of Don Carlos, and so to render herself independent 
of the Liberal party. Her ambassadors were in- 
structed to remind the signatories of the treaty that 
they owed Spain some assistance in men, at least. 
This was not very liberally given. France sent a 
contingent of 4,100 belonging to her Foreign Legion, 
and placed an army of observation along the frontier, 
so as to blockade the Carlist provinces on that side ; 
Portugal furnished a brigade of 6,000 men, com- 



War and Men of War 139 

manded by Baron d' Antas ; England, finally, stationed 
some cruisers off the Biscay coast, and allowed a 
foreign legion of 10,000 to be recruited in her 
territory and to be despatched to the seat of war 
under the command of Sir George de Lacy Evans. 
There were numerous Englishmen, it should be 
mentioned, serving on the Carlist side — among 
them Lord Ranelagh, afterwards notorious as a 
viveur, and young Charles Henningsen, then enter- 
ing upon his stirring career as a soldier of fortune. 

To this officer, then only in his twentieth year, 
we are indebted for an eye-witness's account of the 
first siege of Bilbao, which was a turning-point in 
the history of the war. After his victories at 
Guernica and Descarga, Zumalacarregui was for 
marching straight upon Madrid. Carlos would not 
have it so. He longed for recognition by Russia 
and Austria, and this he thought could most easily 
be obtained by the reduction of a fortress. Such 
a success would facilitate the negotiation of a loan 
with the bankers of London and Frankfort. It was 
the oft-repeated mistake of allowing the actual 
conduct of a war to be regulated by political con- 
siderations. '' Can you take Bilbao .? " the Prince 
asked his lieutenant. " Doubtless," was the reply, 
*'but at an immense sacrifice of men, and what is 
more precious to us, of time." Carlos insisted that 
the town must be taken all the same. Zumalacarregui 
reflected. Bilbao was very strong, and was held 
by a garrison of 4,000 regulars, supported by a 



140 A Queen at Bay 

numerous and sympathetic population ; such a place, 
it seemed, could only be reduced after a long siege. 
But it stands upon a river only six miles from the 
sea, and could therefore be constantly reinforced, 
thanks to the English, French, and Cristino cruisers 
lying in the stream ; Portugalete, which commanded 
the estuary, was held by a strong force of the 
Queen's troops. To besiege Bilbao was, therefore, 
merely to waste time. Zumalacarregui resolved on 
storming it. On the morning of the loth June he 
carried the Begona church by assault ; from this 
point he battered the defences in breach, and ordered 
forward the storming parties. But at that moment 
rang out that cry so terrible to the ear of the soldier 
in action : " The ammunition has run out.'' The 
companies fell back, and the defenders repaired the 
breach. The Carlist general necessarily postponed 
the attack till next night. In the meantime, he 
reconnoitred the position from the balcony of a 
house at Begona. He saw the tall white houses 
bordering the quays, the foreign warships in the 
river, the sea beating against the bar at Portugalete. 
Suddenly he was struck in the leg by a spent bullet. 
He limped out of the balcony, and called for the 
surgeon. To his surprise and dismay, the wound 
was serious, and he found himself obliged to re- 
linquish the command and to submit to medical 
treatment. He was conveyed in a litter to Durango, 
where he was visited by Carlos. The Pretender 
was not ignorant of Zumalacarregui's worth as a 



War and Men of War 141 

general, but the two were unsympathetic, and had 
very little to say. ** It was hardly worth waiting here 
to listen to that twaddle ! " exclaimed the wounded 
man, as his master withdrew ; and he was carried 
on to the village of Cegama, to be treated by a 
local quack called Petriquillo, in whom he placed 
great confidence. To kill a man with the aid of a 
spent bullet in the fleshy part of the leg seems no 
easy task ; but the country doctor did it. *' He 
died,'* says Henningsen, '' the eleventh day after 
he received his wound. He was then delirious, 
and . . . seemed to fancy himself leading on his 
followers in some desperate action ; and breathed 
his last, calling his officers by name, and giving 
orders to his battalions to charge or retire, as if he 
had been fighting that last battle which must have 
decided the fate of Spain, and where we should 
have seen him fall with less regret." 

Carlos heard the news of his death with his 
habitual resignation to the will of Providence. The 
Carlist chief's supreme importance to his own side 
was understood better by his opponents than his 
superiors. His disappearance heartened the de- 
fenders of Bilbao, who were emulous of the glories 
of Zaragoza and Gerona. Eraso, who now com- 
manded the investing force, summoned the town to 
surrender. The governor laid his proposals before 
the city council. The burgesses replied that they 
would rather be buried beneath the ashes of the 
city than yield. The exasperated Carlists threw 



142 A Queen at Bay 

themselves against the entrenchments, to be repulsed 
with great slaughter. Meanwhile, the Queen's 
generals looked on from behind the Ebro, awaiting 
a new commander-in-chief from Madrid, and pre- 
pared apparently to let Bilbao fall, sooner than relieve 
it on their own responsibility. But the siege that 
deprived Carlos of his only great captain brought 
forward the ablest soldier on the opposing side. 
Baldomero Espartero, commanding at Portugalete, 
refused to sit down and let the heroic city fall. He 
was strenuously seconded by General Latre, who 
declared he would go to the relief of the town with 
four men only behind him, if needs were. On July i, 
besiegers and defenders saw the head of the Queen's 
army approaching Bilbao. The disheartened Carlists 
fired a few shots, and retired into the fastnesses of 
Biscay. When Cordova, the new commander-in- 
chief of Isabel's forces, reached the scene of action, 
he found the tide had already turned in his favour. 
He did not let the opportunity slip, but pushed 
on into Navarra, and the hard-fought battle of 
Mendigorria, on July i6, inflicted a loss of 2,000 
men on the defeated Carlists. 

The Pretender already began to feel the loss of 
the gloomy, taciturn general, whom he had latterly 
regarded with suspicion and dislike. He had en- 
trusted the command of his troops to Vicente 
Moreno, who had earned for himself in the late 
reign the sobriquet of the butcher of Malaga, and 
who was incapable of earning the regard or confi- 



War and Men of War 143 

dence of his men, or, indeed, of anybody but his 
Prince. Don Carlos, like Fortune, had queer 
favourites. The death of his wife at Gosport, 
opposite Portsmouth, the year before, had robbed 
him of his most stimulating influence. He seemed 
now content with the mere ceremonial and trappings 
of royalty, and the surest passport to his favour was 
to speak of him as the elect of the Lord, sent to 
restore the faith and to extirpate heresy. In his 
heart of hearts he believed that, come what might, 
the Divine power would place him on the throne 
of his ancestors, and for this reason he was strangely 
indifferent as to the capacity and quaHties of his 
officers. He fell entirely under the influence of 
the Bishop of Leon, who was never tired of com- 
mending his piety. Wherever the Prince went, he 
was followed by a gentleman-in-waiting, laden with 
images and hymn-books ; the Lives of the Saints 
were his favourite reading, the rosary his favourite 
exercise. He would do nothing, Fernandez de los 
Rios tells us, to relieve the distress of the widow 
of General Fulgosio, whose five sons had joined 
the Carlist ranks, two of them having been killed ; 
but he presented one of his courtiers with 10,000 
reales {£100) to spend on his wedding festivities. 
While his troops wanted bread and raiment, we 
find him endowing Jesuit colleges and nunneries to 
the extent of three or four hundred pounds. Once, 
when the whim seized him to assist at Mass, he 
ordered the army to halt in a position where they 



144 A Queen at Bay 

were exposed to the enemy's fire. Two officers 
and a number of men were killed. " They have 
done no more than their duty," said the devout 
Prince, fortified by his spiritual exercises. 

We do not know which to wonder at most — 
the heartless imbecility of the man, or the besotted 
devotion of his followers. Men make greater fools 
of themselves under the influence of political rancour 
than when excited by more natural and primitive 
passions. For it is impossible to believe that it 
was pure zeal for humanity that animated the 
followers of Don Carlos. Such a suspicion is cer- 
tainly absurd in the case of the monster Cabrera, 
whom the Pretender recognized as a kindred soul. 
This man was born at Tortosa in Cataluna in 1806, 
and was trained for the priesthood. He was the 
despair of his superiors. " We shall never make 
a priest of you," said his bishop ; *' you are made 
to be a soldier." Cabrera did not attempt, like the 
Parson Merino, to combine the two callings. Upon 
the outbreak of the civil war, he eagerly espoused 
the cause of Don Carlos and joined one of the bands 
infesting the confines of Cataluna, Aragon, and 
Valencia. But the Queen's troops carried all before 
them, and the insurgents could barely maintain 
themselves in scattered groups in the recesses of the 
mountains. Cabrera determined to join the main 
army of the Pretender. He disguised himself as an 
itinerant seller of soap, and started to make his way 
across country through the Cristino lines. With the 



War and Men of War 145 

help of a devoted woman, called Maria la Albeitaresa, 
he got through in safety. To the Carlist minister 
of war — the Comte d'Espagne's old lieutenant, 
Villemur — he represented the desperate state of 
affairs in Eastern Spain, and insisted on the necessity 
of terrorizing the inhabitants into submission. Any 
system involving executions was likely to be ap- 
proved by the pious Don Carlos. He saw in Cabrera 
a man after his own heart, and directed him to 
return whence he came, furnished with a letter ad- 
dressed to Carnicer, the nominal commander-in-chief 
in those parts. The ex-student of Tortosa set forth 
once more on his perilous journey. At an inn he 
was recognized by a muleteer. He raised a warning 
finger : " Speak, and you are a dead man I " he 
said. The muleteer, terrified by the tigerish ferocity 
of his manner, slunk away. 

On opening his King's letter, Carnicer found 
that he was ordered to hand over the command 
of all the bands to the messenger, and to present 
himself at the royal headquarters without delay, 
Carnicer, as a loyal officer, obeyed these commands 
without hesitation. He left the camp, disguised 
as a muleteer. Of the route he proposed to follow, 
of his stopping-places and his disguise, Cabrera, 
deliberately or heedlessly, spoke to every one. As 
a result, Carnicer was seized while crossing the 
Cristino lines at Miranda del Ebro, and paid the 
penalty of treason. His death was generally laid 
at the door of Cabrera ; but one murder, more 

10 



146 A Queen at Bay 

or less, will make little difference to that chief's 
score. His policy was to strike terror into the 
population, that out of mere fear they should join 
his colours. Between his assumption of the com- 
mand and the end of October 1838, he murdered 
no fewer than 1,283 prisoners of war, and this 
estimate does not appear to include the civilians 
who fell into his hands. When he had slaughtered 
upwards of two hundred persons in cold blood, his 
adversaries hoped to check his ferocity by a severe 
act of retaliation. General Nogueras seized his 
mother, and notified him that he should hold her 
as a hostage for the alcaldes of Valdealgorza and 
Torrecilla, whom he had captured. Cabrera preferred 
the gratification of his blood-lust to his mother's 
safety. He shot the luckless functionaries, and the 
exasperated Cristino general shot their assassin's 
mother. Cabrera used this inhuman reprisal as an 
excuse for further and worse atrocities. He at 
once shot thirty prisoners, including the wives of 
four Cristino officers. At Rubielos he stripped 
his captives naked, ordered them to run for their 
lives, and then, letting loose his cavalry upon them, 
saw them cut down to a man. At Burjasot on 
the banks of the Guadalaviar, he celebrated his 
King's birthday by a banquet, and shot his prisoners 
in batches between the courses. His barbarity 
raised him every day higher in the estimation 
of Don Carlos ; whereas Nogueras, for having 
imitated his methods on a single occasion, was 



War and Men of War i47 

censured by his government and dismissed from 
the command. 

Cabrera was well served by his friends. On one 
occasion, defeated and sorely wounded, he crept 
into a wood, where he was presently found by one 
of his officers. He was conveyed in secret to the 
house of the parson of Almazan, and hidden in 
a closet concealed by a huge bureau. In some way 
or another, it leaked out that the terrible " tiger 
of Morella " was in the village. The alcalde told 
the parson that he proposed to institute a thorough 
search next day. That night four of the wounded 
leader's friends accosted a peasant working in the 
fields, and ordered him, under pain of death, to 
deliver a message to the alcalde of Almazan. The 
functionary turned pale when he perceived that the 
letter was signed by Cabrera himself, and was 
dated from a village a few leagues away. He was 
summoned to furnish 5,000 rations, failing which 
he and the inhabitants of the village would be 
put to the sword. His worship preferred another 
alternative. He took to flight, escorted by all the 
militia and regular troops in Almazan. Having 
nothing to fear from the panic-stricken villagers, 
Cabrera was that night quietly removed by his 
friends to a place of safety. 

The trick was afterwards discovered ; so too was 
the part the parson had played in it. The worthy 
priest was sentenced to death, but was set free on 
the intervention of Cabrera, who offered two 



148 A Queen at Bay 

prisoners of consequence in exchange for him. He 
had not thought it worth while to do as much for 
his mother. 

His ruthless measures had at least the merit of 
success. He soon retrieved his disasters, and found 
himself at the head of a formidable force. His 
mountain stronghold of Morella became the focus 
of the Carlist insurrection in the east. He levied 
toll on all the towns along the coast from the Ebro 
to the Guadalaviar, and ravaged, pillaged, and 
terrorized the whole countryside. Men found it 
safer to be with him than against him. He was 
defeated again and again, but his bands broke and 
dispersed, only to rally stronger than ever next day 
in another part of the country. To the last, he 
adhered to his system, no quarter. He made war 
on the Cristinos to the third and fourth generation, 
till the war in the eastern provinces assumed the 
character of a struggle between fiends rather than 
men. 

To deal with chiefs such as Zumalacarregui and 
Cabrera, Spain had need of a strong man. She 
found one in Baldomero Espartero, the saviour of 
Bilbao. His is a name that looms larger than any 
in Spain in the first half of the nineteenth century. 
In 1835 ^^ ^^^ forty-two years old, and held the 
rank of lieutenant-general in the Queen's army. 
Born in the province of Ciudad Real (Don Quixote's 
country), he had, like two of his most strenuous 
opponents, been destined for the Church. The 




■«^; 



From a lithograph by Alemana 



ESPARTERO 



War and Men of War 149 

French invasion called him to the defence of his 
country, and having once drawn the sword, he 
wielded it all the rest of his life. Overseas in 
South America, Spain was fighting her own rebellious 
children, and there, during eight years, Espartero 
fought his way up to the rank of brigadier. He 
shared in the bloody defeat at Ayacucho, but was 
able to carry back to Spain the colours taken from 
the enemy on more fortunate fields. Nor was the 
guerdon of his valour inconsiderable. He brought 
back enough treasure from the land of the Yncas 
to enable him to contract a very advantageous 
marriage. From the moment Fernando VII. revoked 
the edict of Felipe V., the veteran officer never 
wavered in his loyalty to the direct succession. *' It 
was something," says Major Martin Hume, " at 
this time of distraction and confusion, that there 
was, at all events, one Spaniard who knew his own 
mind, and was bold enough to stand by his opinion. 
Espartero was a man of no great ability or education, 
but he was as honest as was compatible with his 
vast ambition, and as firm as a rock. In this 
blackest hour of the Queen's cause he emerged from 
out of the welter of sloth, ineptitude, and base 
corruption, and by sheer force of character saved 
the throne of Isabel II." 



CHAPTER IX 

THE QUEEN AND THE SERGEANTS 

PRESSED hard by the Carlists, it was only natural 
that Cristina should have endeavoured to sur- 
round herself with sympathetic ministers. Perhaps 
not the least recommendation of Isturiz, Mendizabal's 
successor, was his tactful and tacit recognition of 
her attachment to Mufioz. He did not ask in- 
convenient questions, he expressed no suspicions, in 
fact he took the sensible view that the relations of 
individual men and women were not the concerns 
of any third parties. Cristina, who had a genius for 
maternity, was now the mother of a boy, named 
Agustin Maria. She would have liked to have 
kept him near her, poor mother ; but there was 
talk enough already about his little sister. In 
January 1836, both the children were sent to Paris ; 
and the Queen and her spouse talked about them 
to each other in the pavilion at El Pardo that some 
wag nicknamed Munoz's cage {la j aula de Mufioz), 
Cristina was a warm-hearted, affectionate mother, 
and must have passed many a sleepless night torn 
by her affection for her babies in Paris and her 
little girls in Madrid. 

150 



The Queen and the Sergeants 151 

But the country would have none of Isturlz or his 
Moderate colleagues. In vain did he point to the 
elections, and claim a popular majority. The 
elections everybody knew had been engineered. 
What they also knew was that Isturiz wished to 
open the door a third time within three decades to 
the armies of France. On July 25, 1836, Malaga 
rose in insurrection. The Military and Civil 
Governors endeavoured to quell the tumult, but 
were promptly murdered by the urban militia, a 
body called into existence by the Queen's govern- 
ment. The constitution of 18 12, and nothing but 
the constitution of 18 12, was the cry. It was re- 
echoed, three days later, at Cadiz and Zaragoza. 
Seville, Cordova, and Granada followed suit. 
Madrid pronounced— in the Spanish way — -for the 
old constitution on August 3. But the insurgents 
had to deal with a resolute man in General Quesada, 
whose daring and horsemanship on a memorable 
occasion enraptured George Borrow. The regular 
troops dispersed the urban militia, and completely 
disarmed them. Quesada went even further, and 
forbade the citizens to carry bludgeons or any 
weapons of offence. Order reigned in Madrid. 

In her palace of San Ildefonso at La Granja, 
Cristina with her husband and her royal children 
tranquilly watched events. She relied on the pro- 
tection of the garrison, commanded by the Conde 
de San Roman, and composed of eight companies 
of the royal and provincial guards, two squadrons 



152 A Queen at Bay 

of the bodyguard and two of mounted grenadiers. 
But times had changed since Don Carlos was saluted 
with royal honours by his brother*s guards, and 
the corps was animated now by a nobler sentiment 
than mere devotion to the crown. The officers 
were true, indeed, to the old tradition ; the sergeants, 
who enjoy a higher rank in the Spanish army than 
any other, met nightly in their casino, to read the 
papers and to discuss politics. The determination 
of the ministry to withstand the will of the people 
disgusted them profoundly. They were Spaniards 
first, soldiers afterwards. It seemed to them that the 
safety of the nation was being jeopardized to keep 
a camarilla of the Queen's friends in office. In the 
afternoon of August I2, a militiaman rode in from 
Madrid, and complained that his corps had been 
disarmed by Quesada while Carlist bands were at 
the gates of the capital. Stirred with indignation, 
the sergeants, at the evening parade, called on the 
bandmaster to play the hymn of Riego, the Spanish 
Marseillaise. The band struck up the tune, with- 
out the orders of their chief. San Roman at once 
placed the musicians under arrest, and ordered the 
whole regiment to be confined to barracks. In spite 
of the presence of their officers, the sergeants found 
means to concert their plans. At ten o'clock at 
night the cry " To arms ! " re-echoed through the 
quarters of the grenadiers. The men at once fell 
in on the parade-ground, the sergeants taking the 
officers' places. To the shouts of *' Hurrah for the 



The Queen and the Sergeants i53 

constitution ! Long live the constitutional Queen ! " 
the squadron marched upon the palace. Passing the 
theatre they were confronted by San Roman, who 
exhorted them to return to barracks. While they 
hesitated, they were joined by the Fourth Footguards. 
The men's attitude became menacing, and the 
colonel, mindful of the fate of Canterac, hurried oiF 
to the palace. Arriving at the massive iron gates 
at the end of the avenue, the troops found them 
closed by his order. When they threatened to fire, 
the sentries at once made common cause with them, 
and opened the gates. The battalion, thus rein- 
forced, filed up the avenue. Their shouts reached 
the ears of Cristina. She, so calm and courageous 
in the face of pestilence, turned livid at the approach 
of armed men. The fate of so many of her own 
officers, perhaps of Marie Antoinette, recurred to 
her. In the panic that ensued within the palace, 
no one thought of using the means of defence ready 
to their grasp, for the bodyguard refused to join 
their comrades and stood at the windows of their 
quarters, waiting perhaps for the word to fall in or 
to stand to their arms. But, unmolested, a force of 
sergeants and privates penetrated into the palace, 
and made their way upstairs. 

Cristina's first impulse was to hide herself. San 
Roman succeeded in calming her, and assuring her 
that her life would not be endangered. Meanwhile, 
the Duke of Alagon hurried to the top of the stairs, 
and meeting the sergeants, demanded what they 



154 A Queen at Bay 

wanted. Thinking he proposed to resist their 
passage, they drew their swords. The Duke, how- 
ever, met them with fair words. If, he said, they 
desired an audience with the Queen, they must 
depute their spokesmen, who must behave with a 
gravity befitting their mission. A consultation took 
place ; finally Alejandro Gomez, another non-com- 
missioned officer, and a private were named as the 
men's representatives. 

Her Majesty had by this time recovered her 
composure, and met the soldiers with a serene 
countenance and a pleasant smile. She was attended 
by Barrio Ayuso, the minister of justice, by San 
Roman and Alagon, the officers of the garrison, and 
several ladies- and gen tlemen-in- waiting. Munoz, 
who would probably have been the object of un- 
flattering remarks, kept out of the way. In presence 
of this distinguished gathering, the soldiers remained 
awed and silent, fumbling at their hats and swords. 
At last, in her gracious way, the Regent invited 
them to speak. Gomez stepped forward, knelt, 
and kissed her hand. He then said that he and 
his comrades had been fighting with the army of 
the north for liberty, but that there was still no 
Hberty in Spain, the urban militia had been disarmed, 
and good Liberals were languishing in dungeons. 

The Queen interrupted him : " Do you know 
what liberty is, my son ? " 

The sergeant replied that, whatever it might be, 
it did not obtain in Spain. 



The Queen and the Sergeants i55 

" Liberty," said her Majesty, " is the rule of law 
and obedience to authority." 

The soldier demurred to this definition, and 
insisted that that there could be no liberty while 
the government continued to resist the unanimous 
demands of the nation. Cristina, upon this, turned 
impatiently to the other sergeant. He had less 
to say, but he was more personal. He told the 
Queen that she was pursuing a mistaken policy, 
that she would never get at the truth while the 
Moderates were in power, and that if she did not 
proclaim the constitution of 1812, God alone knew 
what would happen to her and to her family. This 
was worse than Gomez. Luckily, it was now the 
private's turn to speak. He stated they had come 
there to ask the Queen to swear to the constitution 
of 1 8 12. Izaga, the Master of the Household, 
asked him if he had read that document. " No," 
said the honest soldier, '' I can't read, but my 
father at La Corufia told me it was a capital thing." 
The Marques de Cerralbo, hoping to hold the man 
up to derision, asked him to be more precise, and 
to explain the advantages to which his father had 
referred. The guardsman, who seems to have been 
of the Sancho Panza type, made answer that, for one 
thing, salt and tobacco were cheaper under that 
constitution, and that his mother had turned many 
an honest penny as a dealer in the former commodity. 
The Queen and her courtiers burst into laughter, 
whereupon the good-natured fellow laughed also, 



156 A Queen at Bay 

and turning to his comrades, exclaimed, ''I see we 
shall get about as much good out of this as the 
nigger did out of the sermon ! " 

The hilarity which this sally excited was speedily 
quelled by the sergeants bluntly informing the Queen 
that she must sign the constitution there and then. 
Barrio Ayuso alleged that Article 192 would confer 
the regency upon Don Carlos. The soldiers thought 
they could be left to deal with the Prince. Finally, 
they accepted the Queen's promise to convoke the 
Cortes at once, and to lay before it a proposal to 
restore the constitution demanded. 

San Roman and the delegates went out to com- 
municate this assurance to the troops outside the 
palace. Cristina breathed more freely. She had 
emerged safely from the most dangerous situation 
in which she had ever been placed. But the next 
moment groans and angry shouts, mingled with the 
reports of firearms, warned her that the peril was 
not yet over. The men were furious with their 
delegates, whom they accused of having been won 
over with fair words and flattery. Again the tread 
of soldiers was heard on the stairs. The Queen 
and courtiers, terrified, beheld the door flung open 
and a fresh body of sergeants enter. Their spokes- 
man was Higinio Garcia, a brisk, handsome soldier, 
whom no display of dignity or culture could abash. 
Addressing himself directly to her Majesty, he 
insisted that she must proclaim and subscribe to 
the old constitution in his presence. She argued 



The Queen and] the Sergeants i57 

and threatened ; the sergeant's manner became more 
menacing. Finally, she ordered Izaga to draw up 
the decree. It was conceived in these terms : " As 
Queen-Governess of Spain, I ordain and command 
that the political constitution of the year 1812 be 
promulgated, pending the manifestation of the will 
of the people by the Cortes in favour of this or 
another constitution suited to its wishes." Even 
now Cristina hesitated. Garcia seized a pen, dipped 
it in the ink, and handed it to her, saying sternly, 
" Sign, your Majesty, if you don't wish things to 
go further." The Regent obeyed. The court 
officials witnessed her signature. Speechless with 
rage and outraged dignity, they saw the triumphant 
soldiers stride from the room, and listened to their 
swords and spurs ringing on the stairs. We can 
imagine the torrent of imprecations and invectives 
that burst forth when the sound of those martial 
footsteps had died away. 

This bold stroke of the sergeants of the guard 
was no isolated and independent mutiny, but an- 
other expression of the nation's loudly voiced will. 
The guardsmen accomplished what would have 
been done by the peoples of Madrid, Cataluna, 
Aragon, Andalucia, and Valencia, had they been 
able to unite their forces at the capital. The ser- 
geants knew that the nation wanted this thing done, 
and the power to do it seemed to them sufficient 
authority. They sought and obtained no honours 
or rewards. They seemed not to realize the dignity 



158 A Queen at Bay 

or the full importance of their part. They were 
plain men and soldiers, who did this service to 
their country as a matter of duty, just as they 
went to fight the Carlists or would have stormed 
an impregnable redoubt. 

On the morning of August 13, the Prime Minister 
at Madrid received this startling message from 
Barrio Ayuso, " Help, quickly, quickly, or I know 
not what may befall their Majesties." Isturiz at 
once handed this note to Quesada, but before any 
steps could be taken, an officer arrived hot-foot 
from La Granja with a full report of the events of 
the preceding night. The Captain-General proposed 
to march at once to the palace, and to crush the 
guardsmen with his battalions. But the council 
of ministers, to his disgust, was in favour of milder 
measures. If a large body of troops was withdrawn 
from the garrison, Madrid would surely rise. 
Mendez Vigo, the minister for war, was despatched 
to La Granja, his right hand filled with gifts, to 
conciliate the audacious sergeants and to undo by 
cajolery all that had been done by force. 

He reached the royal residence about six in the 
afternoon, and found the troops, refreshed after a 
long siesta, parading the town with a tablet com- 
memorating the restoration of the constitution. 
At their head, with exceeding ill grace, rode San 
Roman. The procession next proceeded to the 
palace, and cheers were given for the Queen-Regent. 
No response came from the shuttered windows. The 



The Queen and the Sergeants i59 

minister perceived that things had gone further 
than his colleagues supposed, but he did not despair. 
He presented himself at the barracks of the 4th 
Footguards, and talked over Gomez and Lucas, 
and a drum-sergeant-major whom he knew to 
have been once an ardent royalist. This man 
accepted a bribe, a fact which became known to 
his comrades by his changing a big gold piece at 
the canteen. As soon as this came to the ears of 
the masterful Garcia, he went straight to the 
minister for war and ordered him to leave the 
place as quickly as he could. Mendez Vigo had 
no choice but to obey, but he persuaded the soldiers 
to allow the Regent to proceed to Madrid to swear 
to the constitution. On second thoughts, however, 
the men realized that this was an attempt to trick 
them. They stopped two waggons leaving the 
palace, and shut the gates. A petition was then 
sent in to the Queen, requesting the dismissal of 
San Roman and Quesada, the appointment of a 
new ministry, the proclamation of the new con- 
stitution in the country, and the re-arming of the 
mihtia of Madrid. Her Majesty was respectfully 
requested to issue these decrees before midnight, 
and when this was done the garrison hoped to have 
the honour of escorting her to Madrid. 

This was rough handling. Cristina sought the 
advice of the English and French ambassadors. 
Both advised her to submit. Villiers, our repre- 
sentative, had been suspected by the Moderate 



i6o A Queen at Bay 

ministry of instigating the demonstration ; but no 
one condemned more loudly or severely than he 
the insolence and disloyalty of the soldiery. Seeing 
that the Queen intended to stand by her promise 
to the troops, the minister for war resigned, as 
also did the Conde San Roman, perhaps to avoid 
being dismissed. " You abandon me !" exclaimed 
Cristina tragically, and at once she made out a 
list of new ministers. Mendez Vigo started ofF 
for Madrid, and announced to the soldiers gathered 
in the park that her Majesty had decided to comply 
with their requests. The men were glad to hear 
this, but intimated to the minister that he had 
better stay till the decrees were actually signed. 
Mastering his anger, the statesman returned to 
the palace, to find that he had been preceded by 
a crowd of sergeants, Garcia at their head. Cristina 
had her temper perfectly under control ; indeed, 
I suspect that she did not find the handsome 
sergeants the brutal wretches she had represented 
them to be to the ambassadors. Seeing they were 
in such a hurry to see the decrees executed, she 
told them to use the room next to her own as 
an office, and had her own tables and escritoire 
wheeled in for their convenience. The military 
scribes then set to work, finding serious difficulties, 
no doubt, in the preparation of documents so much 
outside their experience. Once or twice Garcia 
thought fit to consult the Queen. His comrades 
grew suspicious. " If you come to an understanding 



The Queen and the Sergeants i6i 

with the pasteleros " — the nickname applied to the 
court — "you will be the first to have your throat 
cut," they informed him. This decided him to 
hasten matters. The decrees were drawn up and 
sent in to the Queen to be signed. They were 
returned with the signature in good and proper 
form. 

It now only remained for her Majesty's un- 
invited guests to depart ; but at this moment a 
despatch arrived from Madrid, which they asked 
the Queen to open in their presence. She handed 
it, instead, to Mendez Vigo. This irritated a 
bandsman, who snatched it from the minister's 
hand, exclaiming " Less ceremony ! " However, 
the letter contained nothing more than a request 
for immediate information as to what was going 
on. Even now the sergeants would not let the 
war minister return to Madrid, or entrust him 
with the publication of the decrees. A lively dis- 
pute ensued. " Let Mendez Vigo go to Madrid 
accompanied by your representatives," urged the 
Queen. " Let Garcia go with him." But Garcia 
shook his head. " That won't do," he said. " Since 
I worked the revolution, as one may call it, they 
don't believe in me, and say that I'm plotting with 
your Majesty to deceive them." Then in an attitude 
of disgusted dejection, the sergeant threw himself 
down on a sofa. The Queen, standing, looked from 
him to the others in amazement. Then she in- 
dignantly repudiated the charge of attempting to 

II 



i62 A Queen at Bay 

deceive the troops, with Garcia or anybody else. 
She was cut short by another sergeant : " If he 
had not arranged with your Majesty to undo all 
that is being done, I should already have had the 
cross of Mendigorria, to which I have a right, and 
which he promised me." *' I never said that ! " 
shouted Garcia. The disputants might have pro- 
ceeded from words to blows, had not Mendez Vigo 
parted them, reminding them that it was two o'clock 
in the morning and time for every one to retire. 
The Queen's suggestion that the war minister 
should return to Madrid, accompanied by Garcia, 
was finally adopted, and this most amazing of coups 
d'etat was at an end. 

But before the representatives of the Queen and 
the revolution set out, the news had spread through 
the capital. The militia reassembled and crowds 
gathered threateningly in the Puerta del Sol. From 
a window the scene was witnessed by George Borrow, 
with huge delight in the display of force and audacity. 
'' As the sounds became louder and louder," says this 
evangelist of the Spains, *' the cries of the crowd 
below diminished, and a species of panic seemed to 
have fallen upon all ; once or twice, however, I could 
distinguish the words, Quesada ! Quesada ! The 
foot-soldiers stood calm and motionless, but I ob- 
served that the cavalry, with the young officer who 
commanded them, displayed both confusion and fear, 
exchanging with each other some hurried words ; 
all of a sudden that part of the crowd which stood 



The Queen and the Sergeants 163 

near the mouth of the Calle de Carretas fell back 
in great disorder, leaving a considerable space un- 
occupied, and the next moment Quesada, in complete 
general's uniform, and mounted on a bright bay- 
thoroughbred English horse, with a drawn sword 
in his hand, dashed at full gallop into the arena, 
in much the same manner that I have seen a 
Manchegan bull rush into the amphitheatre when 
the gates of his pen are suddenly flung open. 

"He was closely followed by two mounted officers, 
and at a short distance by as many dragoons. In 
almost less time than is sufficient to relate it, several 
individuals in the crowd were knocked down and 
lay sprawling upon the ground beneath the horses 
of Quesada and his two friends, for as to the 
dragoons, they halted as soon as they entered the 
Puerta del Sol. It was a fine sight to see three 
men, by dint of valour and good horsemanship, 
strike terror into at least as many thousands ; I saw 
Quesada spur his horse repeatedly into the dense 
masses of the crowd, and then extricate himself 
in the most masterly manner. The rabble were 
completely awed and gave way. . . . All at once 
Quesada singled out two nationals [militiamen], who 
were attempting to escape, and setting spurs to his 
horse, turned them in a moment, and drove them 
in another direction, striking them in a contemptuous 
manner with the flat of his sabre. He was crying 
out, * Long live the absolute Queen ! ' [.^] when, 
just beneath me, amidst a portion of the crowd 



i64 A Queen at Bay 

which had still maintained its ground, I saw a small 
gun glitter for a moment, then there was a sharp 
report, and a bullet had nearly sent Quesada to his 
long account, passing so near to the countenance 
of the General as to graze his hat. I had an indis- 
tinct view for a moment of a well-known foraging 
cap just about the spot whence the gun had been 
discharged, then there was a rush of the crowd, 
and the shooter, whoever he was, escaped discovery 
amidst the confusion which arose. 

*' As for Quesada, he seemed to treat the danger 
from which he had escaped with the utmost con- 
tempt. He glared about him fiercely for a moment, 
then leaving the two nationals, who sneaked away 
like whipped hounds, he went up to the young 
officer who commanded the cavalry, and who had 
been active in raising the cry of the constitution, 
and to him he addressed a few words with an air 
of stern menace ; the youth evidently quailed before 
him, and probably in obedience to his orders, resigned 
the command of the party, and rode slowly away 
with a discomfited air ; whereupon Quesada dis- 
mounted, and walked slowly backwards and forwards 
before the Casa de Postas [Correos .?] with a mien 
which seemed to bid defiance to mankind. 

"This was the glorious day of Quesada's existence, 
his glorious and last day. I call it the day of his 
glory, for he certainly never appeared before under 
such brilliant circumstances, and he never lived to 
see another sunset. No action of any hero or 



/ 



The Queen and the Sergeants 165 

conqueror on record is to be compared with this 
closing scene of the life of Quesada, for who by 
his single desperate courage and impetuosity ever 
before stopped a revolution in full course ? Quesada 
did ; he stopped the revolution at Madrid for an 
entire day, and brought back the uproarious and 
hostile mob of a huge city to perfect order and 
quiet. His burst into the Puerta del Sol was the 
most tremendous and successful piece of daring ever 
witnessed." 

The arrival of Mendez Vigo and Sergeant Garcia 
entirely changed the aspect of aiFairs. The ministers 
found themselves no longer in office, and prepared 
for instant flight. Quesada, superseded by General 
Seoane, knew that he stood alone in a city ruled 
by his enemies. He embraced his wife, and ob- 
taining a horse, rode out of the city in the direction 
of Hortaleza. He was recognized by a peasant, 
followed, and arrested by a party of militia. He 
was locked up in a house in the village, while a 
messenger was sent to Madrid to ask for instruc- 
tions concerning him. While talking with his 
guards the General heard the shouts of a crowd 
approaching his prison. He felt for his sword — 
it was gone. Then seating himself on the bench, 
he folded his arms and told the guard to let his 
assassins enter. A minute later, and a mob of 
peasants threw themselves upon the defenceless 
man, and tore him limb from limb. 

Seated that night in a cafe in the Calle Alcala, 



i66 A Queen at Bay 

Borrow saw a party of the murderers returning 
triumphantly from their expedition. They marched 
in, two by two, beating time with their feet to some 
hastily improvised air. When they were seated 
round a bowl of coffee, a blue kerchief was solemnly 
produced. It was untied, and a gory hand and 
three or four dissevered fingers were proudly ex- 
hibited. With these the coffee was stirred up. 
" Cups ! cups ! " cried the nationals. 

In the history of modern Spain, there is no fouler 
assassination than this. Quesada was a severe dis- 
ciplinarian, but he was guilty of no such acts of 
cold-blooded ferocity as may be imputed to half 
the officers of his time and nation. Though a 
Conservative by instinct, he was not a blind re- 
actionary, and, as we have seen, was the first to 
urge the Queen-Regent on the path of constitutional 
reform. But whatever may have been his political 
opinions, he deserves to be remembered by Spaniards 
of all parties as an honourable man who died with 
a dignity and courage worthy of Plutarch's heroes. 

The proclamation of the constitution of Cadiz 
gave general satisfaction throughout Cristino Spain. 
Calatrava, the new prime minister, and Rodil, who 
succeeded San Roman in command of the guards, 
hastened to San Ildefonso to extricate the Regent 
from her uncomfortable situation. They were met 
by Garcia, who walked up the avenue with them. 
" I suppose your Excellencies have realized the value 
of my services," he remarked. " That will be all 



The Queen and the Sergeants 167 

right,'* answered Rodil evasively, and quickened his 
pace. " I should like you to know that yesterday 
the boys saluted me as captain," persisted the 
sergeant. The general repeated that something 
would no doubt be done, and with this assurance 
the simple soldier was content, that evening counsel- 
ling his comrades to place their trust in their new 
commander. On the i8th, the guards made their 
triumphal entry into Madrid, Garcia riding beside 
Rodil. The people greeted them as saviours of 
the nation. A cordial welcome was extended, also, 
to the Queen, who had returned on the previous 
evening to Madrid, accompanied by several members 
of the new cabinet and the French and English 
ambassadors. Again the country was flooded with 
decrees, some announcing the dissolution of the 
lately elected Cortes and the convocation of another, 
others changes in the ministry, one of which happily 
resulted in the return of Mendizabal to the de- 
partment of finance. Upon the proclamation of 
the old constitution, Cordova threw up the command 
of the army of the North, and retired to France. 
He was succeeded, luckily for Spain, by Espartero. 

What became of the prime mover in it all ? 
Calatrava and several of his colleagues thought that 
something should be done for Garcia. His example 
was bad, of course ; still, but for him and his comrades 
they would not be sitting there. Cristina approved 
a proposal for his promotion. I suspect she rather 
liked his dashing ways, and that his familiarity. 



i68 A Queen at Bay 

tinged with admiration, had not been altogether 
disagreeable to her. Besides, he had certainly- 
moderated the violence of his companions. The 
scheme was thwarted by Mendizabal. "No,'* he 
said, " we must not encourage insubordination and 
mutiny." But he was encouraging it, by forming 
part of a ministry which owed its existence to it. 
Garcia, hearing of his opposition, went to his office 
and abused him roundly. The minister gave the 
sergeant in charge, and had him sent to Almaden. 
Thence he escaped, only to fall into the hands of 
a Carlist band, who stripped him to the waist, and 
flourished his shirt at the end of a pole as a glorious 
trophy. Eighteen months after the events in which 
he had played so prominent a part, one of the 
royal bodyguard sat in the moonlight with a Polish 
traveller. Baron Dembowski, beneath the windows of 
the palace of La Granja, and told of his pitiable fate. 
" I thought never again to see Garcia in the 
flesh,** said the soldier, " when one day, while on 
leave at Valladolid, I was touched on the shoulder 
by a ragged wretch with a beard like a savage's. 
' You don't then recognize me ? ' said he. It was 
the voice of Garcia. Flying from Almaden, he had 
taken refuge with a relation near Valladolid, and 
had come into the town in the hope of finding a 
friend. Recognized during the day by several of 
his old comrades, he became an object of suspicion 
to the governor, who, fearing that some new 
revolutionary project was afoot, had him arrested. 



The Queen and the Sergeants 169 

" Hardly a fortnight later, I was sent to 
Benavente to act as adjutant. 1 arrived ; and the 
next day was informed that a prisoner had been sent 
down from Valladolid. I told them to bring him 
in. Imagine my surprise when I found myself once 
more face to face with Garcia. The next day, in 
accordance with positive instructions from the 
Captain-General at Valladolid, he was sent under 
a strong escort to Santander. What has become of 
him since ? Has he been sent to America, as they 
say ^ Has he been killed, like his own revolution, 
by the Moderates ? These are questions that no 
one so far has answered." 

Garcia, the champion of the new order, did not 
fare much better than Quesada, the defender of 
the old. 



CHAPTER X 

EXIT CARLOS 

THE news from La Granja gladdened the heart 
of Don Carlos. Things had not gone very well 
with him of late : his second attempt upon Bilbao, 
in the preceding October (1835), ^^^ heen frus- 
trated by the English bluejackets, and these trouble- 
some foreigners, together with the English legion 
under Sir George de Lacy Evans, had beaten off 
his men from San Sebastian in the following spring. 
But now it seemed to the Pretender, the Virgin 
of the Seven Dolors, lately gazetted generalissima 
of his force, had intervened on his behalf. The 
restoration of the constitution of Cadiz should 
frighten all the Conservatives in Spain into the 
true fold. Clearly there was no choice but be- 
tween him and the revolution. Accordingly it was 
without surprise that Carlos saw Don Joaquin 
Roncali come into his camp at Durango, bringing 
letters from the Marques de Zambrano and other 
grandees of Spain ; but it was with the utmost 
indignation that he rejected the offer of their armed 
support, when he heard that in return he was ex- 

170 



Exit Carlos 171 

pected to make some concessions, however slight, to 
the spirit of the age. The impudent envoy was at 
once conducted under escort to the French frontier. 
Similar proposals made by the foreign courts in touch 
with his agents were equally scorned. Rebellious 
Spain must at once acknowledge her master and 
King, the Lord's anointed. It would be time then, 
perhaps, to talk of mercy and concessions. 

But even in presence of the red spectre, there was 
no disposition on the part of Spaniards generally 
to shelter themselves under the sceptre of the 
absolute King. They stood aloof while his colours 
were flaunted from one end of the country to the 
other and back again by the intrepid Miguel Gomez 
and his band of four thousand and odd men. Cities, 
such as Palencia and Cordova, were surprised and 
laid under contribution by the expeditionary force ; 
the rich quicksilver deposits of Almaden — and the 
shirt of Sergeant Garcia — were seized ; small bodies 
of the Queen's troops, defeated and captured ; her 
best generals, outwitted and eluded. Hemmed in 
by three divisions at Ronda, Gomez cut his way 
through, and found his way back to the left bank 
of the Ebro, laden with booty and without serious 
loss. But as a recruiting oflBcer, he had failed in 
his mission. His master saw that he must prove 
himself to be something more than a chief of guer- 
rilleros^ to be recognized as King of Spain by foreign 
powers and by Spaniards themselves. 

He resolved, accordingly, on another attack upon 



172 A Queen at Bay 

Bilbao. This time, the city must be taken at all 
costs. The Carlists were now equipped with an 
efficient siege train and a powerful force of artillery. 
On October 25, for the third time, the townsfolk 
were deafened by the roar of the Pretender's guns. 
The shells were heavier, the practice better than 
had been the case before. To resist what was 
obviously a supreme effort, the commandant could 
dispose of a force of only 4,300 men — not enough 
to hold the whole line of defence. But Bilbao 
was used to this business, and kept a stout heart. 
With their shells hurtling overhead, the Carlists 
rushed to the attack, to be repulsed after a hand- 
to-hand fight upon the parapets. All through 
November, the siege was hotly pressed. It looked 
as if this time the valiant city must fall. *' Hold 
out ! " was the message of Espartero, the new 
commander-in-chief. He advanced with 14,000 
men through the snow-covered passes to the relief 
of the beleaguered city. Villareal, the Carlist 
leader, awaited him in a strong position. Espartero 
executed a flank march, reached the sea at Castro, 
and transported his men on the English ships to 
Portugalete. Bilbao was only six miles away, but 
the Carlists contested the ground inch by inch. 
The Nervion was bridged by the English bluejackets, 
but on the farther bank the enemy occupied a strong 
position along a tributary stream called the Luchana. 
Snow was falling heavily ; Espartero was down 
with fever and could give orders only from his 



Exit Carlos 173 

sick-bed. On Christmas Eve, he knew the decisive 
moment for the attack had come. He mounted 
his horse, placed himself at the head of two 
battalions, and told his men that they must clear 
the road to Bilbao at the point of the bayonet. 
Here was the leader the Liberals had so long 
wanted. With ringing cheers, the Queen's troops 
struggled up the hillside through the blinding snow 
and the murderous hail of bullets. Before the 
thrust of their bayonets, the Carlists fled. Panting, 
bloodstained, victorious, the Cristinos stood on the 
heights of Banderas, while all down the slope behind 
them the price of their victory could be reckoned 
in strangely shaped snow-clad piles. 

On Christmas Day, Bilbao greeted her deliverers. 
The generous commander demanded that the colonels 
of all the regiments of the garrison should be pre- 
sented to him, and he embraced them warmly in 
turn. In his order of the day, he extolled the 
valour and devotion of his English allies, claiming 
for them a large share in the victory. At Madrid 
the victors were compared to the Titans ; the name 
of Bilbao was inscribed on a gold tablet in the 
ParHament House ; and the Queen-Regent con- 
ferred upon the city, already styled *' unconquered " 
and " unconquerable," the titles " most noble " and 
'* most loyal." 

A victory had indeed been gained over the 
Carlists, but by whom ? and were there, Cristina 
asked herself, only two parties in Spain ? Since 



174 A Queen at Bay 

the mutiny at La Granja, she had been placed 
between two fires — Carlos and the revolution. The 
Cortes called together in pursuance of her promise 
to the sergeants had not re-enforced the con- 
stitution of Cadiz, and had drawn up another 
charter, very much less democratic ; but Cristina 
knew by this time the worth of Spanish con- 
stitutions, and placed little reliance on the 
prerogatives they secured to the sovereign. It 
seemed to her and to her most intimate advisers 
that she had started on a downward slope, at 
the bottom of which blazed the fires of anarchy. 
In January 1837 her fears were quickened by a 
formidable outbreak at Barcelona, when the very 
institution of monarchy was denounced. The word 
Republic was heard in many mouths. The Queen's 
heart misgave her. When her army had crushed 
the Pretender, might it not turn against her, as 
her own guard had done ? The essential weakness 
of hereditary monarchy is that the sovereign has 
definite interests distinct from those of the nation 
at large. Unlike a president, he does not represent 
the policy of the majority for the time being or 
the will of the people, but he conceives himself 
bound to maintain his own office and his dynasty 
at all costs. History affords few instances of 
sovereigns' stepping down from their throne when 
they could no longer interpret the desires of their 
subjects. Amadeo was to do that in Spain within 
Cristina's lifetime ; she, in 1837, believed it to be 



Exit Carlos i75 

her duty to transmit the sceptre to her daughter, 
intact and undiminished in weight. And she was 
not only Regent, but a mother. Few could blame 
her for fulfilling the trust reposed in her by her 
child's father, and for preferring her child's interests 
to the will of a nation among which she was a 
foreigner. In 1837, those born in the purple 
honestly looked upon the people as their inalienable 
vassals. The idea finds distinct and repeated ex- 
pression in the earlier writings of our own Queen 
Victoria. Cristina, concerned for her daughter, her 
husband, and herself, fell to considering the posture 
of affairs from a personal standpoint. 

She was probably aware of the overtures made 
to Don Carlos by the nobles ; but if he rejected 
their proposals, he might still be willing to drive 
a bargain with her. Her easy-going, pleasure- 
loving nature revolted against the continual strain 
of the regency. She would not be sorry to be 
rid of it, if she could secure her daughter's throne. 
She gave utterance to this thought more than once 
in the hearing of persons affected towards the 
Pretender. Among these was her countryman, the 
Marchese della Grua, who had formerly represented 
Naples at the Spanish court. Since Cristina's 
brother had refused to recognize Isabel II., his 
ambassador remained at Madrid nominally in the 
character of keeper of the legation archives. Cala- 
trava, the new radical premier, grew suspicious of 
him, and gave him his passports. Cristina wrote to 



176 A Queen at Bay 

him, assuring him of her esteem for him personally. 
Having thus conciliated him, she secretly trans- 
mitted him an autograph letter, in which she declared 
that she would fall into the arms of Don Carlos, 
on the condition only that his eldest son should 
espouse her daughter, and that he would pardon 
the persons who had compromised themselves on 
her behalf, and of whom she would give him a 
list. 

Delia Grua betook himself with this letter to 
Naples, and laid it before his sovereign. King 
Bomba, who spent his life conspiring against the 
liberties of his own subjects, highly approved the 
plan, and saw in it a means of healing the dis- 
sensions in his family and of rescuing his sister 
from the detested Liberals. At his command or 
at Cristina's, Meyer, the Neapolitan consul at 
Bordeaux, soon after appeared at Madrid, and had 
an interview with the Regent. Upon his return to 
Bordeaux, he made use of the Baron de Milanges, 
an ardent Legitimist and a follower of the Comte 
de Chambord. Furnished with letters from the 
consul, the Baron, who assumed the name of 
Neuillet, made his way across the Pyrenees, and 
obtained an audience of the Pretender. Then he 
proceeded to Marseille, where Meyer awaited him. 
The two took ship for Valencia, with letters of 
introduction from the Conde de Rotova to the 
Baronesa de Andia. They then made their way 
to Madrid, where the Marques de Casa Gaviria 





P- 176] 



MARIA CRISTINA 

QUEEN OF SPAIN 



Fyom a lithograph 



Exit Carlos tn 

was able to Introduce them into the presence of 
the Regent. 

According to the Conde de la Alcudia, the Carlist 
agent at Vienna, the Pretender's reply to the Queen's 
proposals was to the following effect : Considering 
the bondage in which her Majesty was held, and 
the desire she had expressed to take refuge with 
her daughters in the bosom of his family, his 
Catholic Majesty was of the same opinion as the 
King of the Two Sicilies, that the best way of 
escaping from the dangers that surrounded her and 
of putting an end to the civil war, would be for 
her and her daughters to join him at once ; to 
facilitate this project, orders would be given to the 
generals operating on Madrid to render all possible 
assistance to the august fugitives ; that when her 
Majesty had formally and publicly recognized Carlos 
as King of Spain in the presence of his staff, he 
would be willing to acknowledge her rights as 
Queen-Dowager and her daughters as Infantas ; the 
Queen would enjoy the same advantages in Spain 
as in Naples. 

This was not the answer Cristina wanted. She 
was ready to betray her partisans and her adopted 
country, but she would not surrender her daughter's 
right to sit on the throne of Spain. We do not 
know what was her reply to the envoys. It was 
probably evasive. The Baron de Milanges passed 
over to Naples, where he was rewarded for his 
services with the Order of San Gennaro ; Meyer 

12 



178 A Queen at Bay 

returned to his post at Bordeaux, where the good- 
will he testified towards the Carlists earned him 
nothing more substantial than their gratitude. 
Cristina hardened her heart, and on June 17, 
1837, in presence of and in the name of her 
daughter, solemnly and publicly swore to observe 
the new constitution. "If 1 break my oath, I 
deserve not to be obeyed," so ran the declaration ; 
" and may God call me to account if I fail." In 
her speech from the throne, the Regent proclaimed 
afresh before the Cortes, and " in the face of heaven 
and earth," her spontaneous adhesion to and free 
and entire acceptation of the political institutions to 
which she had subscribed, in presence of her august 
daughter, whose sentiments she hoped would never 
diiferi from her own. To celebrate the promulga- 
tion of the constitution, her Majesty decreed an 
amnesty to which there were so many exceptions 
that, as was remarked at the time, smugglers ap- 
peared to be the only offenders who could possibly 
benefit by it. 

While with some show of sincerity Cristina thus 
publicly threw in her lot with the Liberals, Carlos 
was on his way to Madrid. Determining to take 
advantage of the Queen's dissatisfaction with the 
constitutional party and her disposition towards a 
reconciliation, he did not wait for the conclusion 
of the secret negotiations between them, but on the 
1 6th May started with his whole court and an army 
of 14,000 men on his march to the capital. Two 



Exit Carlos 179 

months before his troops had inflicted a severe 
defeat upon the English legion at Hernani, and 
since then the Cristinos had attempted no move- 
ments of importance. From every point of view 
the march was well timed. Near Huesca, the 
Cristino general Irribarren threw himself across the 
Pretender's path. He was defeated and slain, and 
the victors pushed on to Barbastro, where they 
routed Oraa, the Captain-General of Aragon, with 
a loss of 600 men. The Carlists now crossed the 
Cinca and penetrated into Cataluna, hotly pursued 
by the Queen's troops under the Baron de Meer ; 
overtaken by him at Gra, they suffered a severe 
check, but rallied at Solsona and pushed south 
towards Tortosa. Cabrera, hastening to the aid of 
his chief, stationed himself on the Ebro at Cherta, 
and held the enemy in check while Carlos crossed 
the river. The Pretender greeted his ablest lieu- 
tenant with as much cordiality as his cold nature 
permitted, and named him commander-in-chief of 
the kingdoms of Aragon, Valencia, and Murcia. 
The united force now advanced into the province 
of Castellon de la Plana, and wasted precious time 
besieging the town of that name. This delay 
enabled Oraa to overtake them, and on July 15, 
at Chiva, west of Valencia, he exacted ample satis- 
faction for his reverse at Barbastro. Carlos found 
it necessary to take refuge in the mountain strong- 
hold of Cantavieja, which Cabrera had taken great 
pains to fortify, while his army was broken up 



i8o A Queen at Bay 

into small detachments which ravaged the huerta of 
Valencia. While the Cristinos were planning a 
general enveloping movement, news came that 
another Carlist column commanded by Zariategui, 
an old friend and officer of Zumalacarregui, had 
crossed the Ebro and was threatening Madrid from 
the north. This drew off part of the Queen's forces, 
and Carlos, resuming the offensive, defeated one of 
Oraa's lieutenants at Herrera and again at Villar 
with a loss of 2,600 men. He then pressed straight 
on to Madrid, although Espartero was hurrying 
down from the north and threatened his flank and 
rear. But the Pretender cared little for the military 
prospects of the expedition, believing that the Regent 
awaited him at Madrid only to throw herself into 
his arms. On September lo, he slept in the house 
of Munoz's father at Tarancon. On the 12th, he 
established his headquarters at Vallecas, within sight 
of the capital of Spain. 

He was too late. The radical ministry of Cala- 
trava had fallen, and with a Moderate cabinet in 
office, Cristina felt her taste for queenship revive. 
She felt herself able to bridle the revolution. Per- 
haps with the intention of luring on her rival to 
Madrid and exposing him to capture, she had kept 
his agents in ignorance, it would seem, of this 
change in her dispositions. A proclamation circulated 
among the Castillians assured them that a settlement 
between the contending parties was to be effected 
by the union of Fernando VII.'s daughter with the 



Exit Carlos i8i 

eldest son of Carlos V. Agents passed between 
the royal palace and the camp at Vallecas, but 
they could extract no definite promises or answers 
from the Queen. Sick at heart, the Pretender 
waited for the summons to take his place on the 
throne of his ancestors. But Cristina made no 
sign. Carlos had been tricked. To attack the city, 
he could not dare. Every citizen had flown to 
arms ; the garrison, enthusiastic and warlike, far 
outnumbered his own force. Not a single cry was 
raised for the absolute King. Cristina, as she rode 
along the ranks, was lustily cheered. Fearing that 
those in the secret of her negotiations with the 
enemy might still endeavour to realize their hopes, 
she anxiously inquired where a certain general was 
posted. The minister of war told her, and then 
asked if she distrusted the officer. " No," replied 
her Majesty, *' but I am fond of him, and do not 
wish him to be at the post of danger." Probably 
she feared he might open the gates to the enemy. 
Afterwards the general threw in his lot with the 
Carlists. 

It was useless to tarry longer before Madrid. 
Cristina had clearly made up her mind to keep her 
daughter on the throne, with or without a constitu- 
tion. The Pretender's disappointment must have 
been poignant. In bitterness of heart, he turned 
his slender column in the direction of Guadalajara. 
At Brihuega he narrowly escaped being captured by 
Espartero. Hurrying through the mountains, he 



i82 A Queen at Bay 

effected a junction with Zariategui at Aranda de 
Duero, and for a moment thought of marching 
into Aragon. But the Navarrese and the Basques 
announced their determination to return to their 
own provinces, whether he would or not. On 
October 24, the expeditionary force recrossed the 
Ebro into Navarra, when Carlos endeavoured to 
throw the blame of his failure on his officers, whom 
he loudly accused of incapacity, cowardice, and 
treachery. Neither he nor his followers need have 
reproached themselves. It is impossible to believe 
that he had ever dreamt of taking Madrid by force 
of arms. He had relied on Cristina's dread of the 
revolution, and could not have foreseen that the 
moderation of the enfranchised people would so 
soon allay her fears and revive her tenacity of power. 
With the retreat from Madrid, the tide turned. 
The CarlistSj beyond making an occasional raid 
into the interior of the kingdom, were content to 
hold their own in Navarra and Guipuzcoa, and in 
the remote districts infested by the Tiger of Morella. 
Espartero having with great severity quelled a serious 
mutiny among his troops, regained their favour and 
confidence by using his ever-growing influence with 
the government to better their condition. In con- 
sequence of his exertions, he was able to oppose a 
force of over 90,000 men to a Carlist army just 
one-third of that number. Yet still the stubborn 
Basques and Navarrese fought on, while the un- 
worthy object of their devotion lorded it at Estella, 



Exit Carlos 183 

dismissed his toy ministers, and disgusted his ablest 
leaders. His unpopularity was increased by his 
marriage with his dead wife's sister, the truculent 
Princess of Beira, whose capacity for making mischief 
remained unabated. She narrowly escaped detention 
at Toulouse by her anxiety to be recognized as the 
affianced bride of Carlos V.^ and the regal pomp she 
assumed contrasted painfully with the wretchedness 
of her husband's troops. It is said that many of 
the raids were undertaken only to make good her 
extravagance. She quarrelled incessantly with the 
generals, and forbade her husband's eldest son, Carlos 
Luis, to appear before the troops. Her distrust of 
the young Prince, to whom as a child she had been 
much attached, was due to the scheme, so often 
talked of, of inducing Don Carlos to resign his 
claims in his favour. This project was particularly 
welcome to the moderate Carlists, of whom the 
foremost was Don Rafael Maroto, now commander- 
in-chief of the army round Estella. Though unable 
to dispense with this chief's services, the Pretender 
never ceased to slight him and to put every obstacle 
in his way. "The only generals your Majesty 
should place confidence in are those that cannot 
read or write," said his lordship of Leon. Maroto 
threw up his command and retired to France. 
Carlos told him to return immediately. He did 
so, travelling day and night, and presented himself 
before his sovereign, wayworn and travel-stained. 
" How dare you appear before me thus ! " cried 



184 A Queen at Bay 

the Prince, and refused to admit him to his presence 
till three or four days had passed. He then re- 
stored him to the command of the army, and 
promptly instigated four battalions to mutiny. 
Maroto shot the ringleaders, including several officers 
of high rank, and Carlos proclaimed him an assassin 
and a traitor. Three days later the proclamation 
was withdrawn, and Maroto was confirmed in all 
his functions. These miserable dissensions con- 
tinued, while the Carlist forces dwindled away, and 
the ground they held was narrowed daily by 
Espartero. By the middle of 1839, Maroto was 
weary of the whole business, and saw that the cause 
of Don Carlos was irretrievably lost. As an honour- 
able man, he should have contented himself with 
leaving the service, instead of which he opened up 
negotiations through Lord John Hay, the English 
admiral, with the commander of the Queen's 
troops. Espartero contemptuously rejected any pro- 
posals implying the abandonment of the regency 
by Cristina or the union of her daughter with the 
Pretender's son. He would not consent to an 
armistice, but at last the two generals met at a 
farmhouse between Durango and Elorrio, where 
the basis of a capitulation was agreed upon. Carlos 
knew that negotiations were going on, but to what 
settlement they tended he was not exactly informed. 
He hated and distrusted Maroto, but he dared not 
come into open collision with him. Unable to use 
force, he resolved to make a last appeal to the 



Exit Carlos 185 

sentiment of his troops. He appeared before them, 
dressed in full uniform with all the insignia of 
royalty. With him were his eldest son, the Infante 
Sebastian, and a brilliant staff. Maroto and his 
officers followed at a little distance, suspicious of 
the intentions of the Prince's escort. The harangue 
that Carlos had carefully prepared fell flat. He was 
no orator, and, obsessed by a sense of his own 
supreme importance and dignity, he could talk only 
of his prerogatives, and appeal to his men to shed 
their last drop of blood for him. A few Castillian 
battalions responded indeed with shouts of Viva 
el Rey ! but the other regiments cheered for their 
general. ** Men," said the Prince, with a certain 
dignity, "when your King is present, he is your 
general." Again he exhorted them to fight for him 
to the death. The ranks were silent. " How is 
this ? " asked Carlos. One of Maroto's staff drew 
near. " They don't understand Castillian, Sire," he 
explained. '' Then ask them in Basque," impru- 
dently commanded the Pretender. The officer 
smiled, and instead of translating the Prince's appeal, 
shouted in the Basque tongue, *' Paquia naidenzete^ 
muct iliac ? " (Do you w^ish for peace, lads ?) The 
soldiers answered as with one voice, " Bay^ Jauna I " 
(Yes, sir !) A loyal officer hurriedly explained the 
purport of question and answer to Carlos. '' We 
are sold," cried the Prince with infinite bitterness, 
and without deigning to reproach the troops who 
deserted him, he galloped away. Maroto watched 



i86 A Queen at Bay 

him go. " We could take him, now," whispered an 
officer. '' Bah ! that would be a crime ! " replied 
the general whom Carlists to this day compare to 
Judas Iscariot. 

Carlos having abandoned the army, and retreated 
with a handful of followers to the recesses of the 
Pyrenees, there was no hindrance to the progress 
of negotiations. On the 29th August, 1B39, the 
famous treaty of Vergara was signed by both com- 
manders. Espartero pledged his word to recommend 
the Cortes to maintain the fueros of the Basque 
Provinces ; the rank of the officers of Maroto's army 
was to be confirmed, their arrears of pay to be 
discharged ; the men were free to return unmolested 
to their homes, or to re-engage, should room be 
found for them, in the Queen's service. The two 
armies were brought face to face on the 31st August. 
The two generals rode out and embraced each other 
between the ranks. Maroto turned towards his 
men : *' Do you wish,'* he cried, *' to live like true 
Spaniards, all under one flag } If so, run and 
embrace your brothers, as I do your general." With 
hearty cheers, Cristinos and Carlists rushed towards 
each other and clasped hands. The bloody six 
years' campaign was at an end. For Carlos, neither 
Navarra nor the Basque Provinces offered a single 
place of safety. A few days after the convention 
had been signed, he crossed into French territory. 

In Cataluna and the other eastern provinces, the 
Carlists still fought on. The old Comte d'Espagne 



Exit Carlos 187 

returned to the province which he had once ruled 
with an iron hand, to strike a last blow for despotism. 
For some time he held his own against the Queen's 
forces in the extreme north. But his cruelty dis- 
gusted and exasperated even his own brutal followers. 
Carlos was prevailed upon to dismiss him from the 
command. The Carlist Junta gave him no chance 
of resisting the decree. He was seized, gagged, and 
disarmed as he sat at the council table, and then 
informed of his supersession. When permitted to 
speak, the Count professed his profound respect for 
his King's orders, and his readiness to obey them. 
"You must ride, then, with us to the republic of 
Andorra," announced his captors. The old general 
asked for a moment's grace, to say a prayer in the 
village church. When he rose from his knees, his 
look was that of a man doomed to die. Mounted 
on a mule and escorted by several members of the 
Junta, he was taken that night to the parsonage of 
Sisgque. Next morning, he was ordered to divest 
himself of his uniform and to don the clothes of a 
peasant. Upon his refusal, a ludicrous scene was 
witnessed, his gaolers attempting the almost im- 
possible feat of clothing a man by main force. 
Threatened with a musket, the Count at last sub- 
mitted, and, thus disguised, was forced to resume his 
journey. They rode by devious and unfrequented 
paths, to avoid the Cristinos, to a house near 
Organya, on the Segre, where the once-formidable 
Captain-General was confined for four days. The 



i88 A Queen at Bay 

unhappy man was indeed, in a familiar phrase, 
between the devil and the deep sea. To be delivered 
from his Carlist foes, he could only look to the 
Cristinos ; and with them, he knew, short shrift 
awaited him. 

His captors had determined that he should die. 
Again he was mounted on a mule, and told to set 
forward. He lit a cigar. '* A dark night ! " he 
murmured. No one replied. They knew that he 
would want no light on the journey he was about 
to undertake. The party rode on in silence. On 
reaching the high-road, a man stepped out of the 
darkness and laid his hand on the Count's bridle. 
"It is the guide that will lead you to Andorra,'* 
said the leader of the party. D'Espagne felt his 
mule drawn forward rapidly. Looking back, he saw 
that his escort had disappeared. For a moment, 
perhaps, he believed himself to be on the road to 
safety. He heard the waters of the Segre, and a 
moment later neared the bridge. Two men rushed 
forward, crying to him to halt. Thinking, no 
doubt, these were picquets from the Queen's army, 
he dismounted. The next instant, he was felled to 
the ground, and bound with cords. " I'm a French 
trader," gasped the wretched man. ** Take me to 
the Governor. He knows me well." " Ay, we 
will take you to him," replied his unknown captors, 
the agents of the Carlist Junta. He was lifted, 
bound, on to his mule, and carried to the water's 
edge. One of the men flung him to the ground, 



Exit Carlos 189 

and deliberately passed a noose round his neck. 
Pressing his foot against the back of the struggling 
man, he drew the knot with all his strength^ The 
Comte d'Espagne was slowly strangled. His assas- 
sins stripped his body naked, and flung it into 
the river. Next day the current deposited its 
gruesome burden against the piers of a village 
bridge, and then the Catalans knew that the monster 
who had oppressed them was really dead. How 
could he by this one deith, however ignominious, 
atone for the thousands of murders that lie at his 
door ? 

Undismayed by treachery, defection, and mutiny, 
the ruthless, dauntless Cabrera still held out, resolved 
to die in the last ditch. Driven by Espartero from 
his stronghold of Morella, he made a last stand on 
the slopes of the Pyrenees. At Berga, on the 4th 
July, 1 840, he was compelled at last to admit defeat. 
He and his men crossed the frontier, and were made 
prisoners by the French authorities. The terrible 
guerilla chief was at first interned in the fortress of 
Ham, and then allowed to reside in the South of 
France. Ultimately, he passed over into England. 
He became a favourite in the most respectable 
circles, and died the husband of an opulent English 
lady of pronounced Evangelical views. 

He that was the cause of it all surrendered to 
the representatives of the French government at 
Bayonne. He was told that he would be detained 
in a kind of honourable captivity at Bourges, not 



iQo A Queen at Bay 

far from the place where he had spent six years as 
the prisoner of Napoleon. The Infante Sebastian 
accompanied him ; but so fiercely did they quarrel 
that they would not eat at the same table during 
their journey or at its end. The young Prince soon 
after sought and obtained leave to join his young 
wife, Cristina's sister, at the court of Naples. His 
defection embittered his mother and her husband 
all the more against him. They maintained a mimic 
court, with every attention to punctilio and ceremony ; 
their followers swaggered about Bourges, a source 
of danger to the inhabitants and trouble to the 
police, who had orders not to follow them over the 
Prince's threshold. The Pretender's court became 
the centre of innumerable intrigues not only against 
the throne of Isabel II., but against the government 
of Louis Philippe. The Marques de Miraflores de- 
tected a conspiracy to take the Spanish Queens oft 
by poison ; and though all knowledge of the plot 
was denied, and probably truly, by the Pretender, 
it was certainly within the moral compass of his 
leading partisans. Then came revivals of the 
scheme to marry Carlos Luis to the young Isabel ; 
haughty appeals to Metternich ; remonstrances with 
the French government. Even Carlos wearied of 
it all, at last. In 1844 he resigned his pretensions 
to his first-born son, and assumed the title of Conde 
de Molina — one of the many titles of the Spanish 
sovereign. Three years later, Isabel II. having 
been married, he was suffered to retire to Austria. 



Exit Carlos 191 

He died at Trieste, on March 10, 1855, at the age 
of sixty-seven years. 

Men squander their lives, as if they had not one 
but nine. To this unlucky Prince was given at 
his birth a prize that men with a far greater capacity 
than his might have envied. Infante of Spain, 
brother and son of a King, he might have lived 
nobly, grandly, and contentedly, with profit to 
himself and millions of 'As countrymen. But his 
ambition — all that was big about him — would be 
satisfied with nothing less than a crown. To win 
that prize, he threw away his own life, embittered 
his brother's declining years, shed the blood of 
countless Spaniards, and brought his country to 
the verge of ruin. Unhappily, all the mischief that 
he sowed died not with him. It may be that, 
inspiring this greed of authority, there was some 
perverted sense of duty, some deeply rooted belief 
in himself and his mission. It is, at least, to be 
hoped there was ; and that therein Carlos of Bourbon 
found consolation for his twenty-two years of exile 
and for the untold miseries he brought on his native 
land. 



CHAPTER XI 

THE DOWNFALL OF CRISTINA 

THE convention of Vergara left Baldomero 
Espartero the most powerful man in Spain. 
He had succeeded where every other general in 
the kingdom had failed. The rise of a strong man 
interests no one in the state more deeply than it 
does the sovereign. Cristina, partly out of gratitude, 
partly from policy, lavished favours and rewards on 
the victorious general. She made him marshal, 
Count of Luchana, and Duke of Victory ; she 
summoned his wife to court, and gave her an 
appointment about her person. Every eye in Spain 
was fixed on Espartero. To which party would 
he attach himself? What use would he make of 
his popularity ? Politically he was an unknown 
quantity till, after his victory at Luchana, he was 
recalled with his army to the capital to protect it 
against the columns of Gomez and Zariategui. 
During his stay in Madrid, he was courted not 
only by the Queen-Regent, but by the leaders of 
every faction. Despairing at last of securing his 
support, the Moderates, more impatient than their 

192 



The Downfall of Cristina 193 

rivals, began to tamper with the troops directly ; 
and so far succeeded that one morning the general 
was awakened by a deputation of officers, who in- 
formed him that they would resign their commands 
unless the Calatrava ministry vacated office. It 
was the counter stroke to the revolt of La Granja. 
Espartero contented himself with exhortations to 
obedience ; his lieutenant, Rivero, took the officers 
at their word, dismissed them, and mustered the 
troops under the sergeants. But this was not the 
upshot designed by the wire-pullers of the move- 
ment, among whom there can be little doubt was 
Cristina herself Her Majesty, in deference to the 
mutineers, dismissed Calatrava and his colleagues, 
giving their portfolios to an interim ministry at 
the head of which was an old statesman named 
Bardaji. The portfolio of war she gave to Espartero, 
who accepted it, only to resign it immediately into 
the hands of a supporter. Then with his army 
he returned to the seat of war, in pursuit of Don 
Carlos, and satisfied that he would shortly be in 
a position to determine the destinies of Spain. 

Cristina was now approaching the prime of life 
and the sixth year of her regency. She was innately 
shrewd, and experience had. left her little to learn of 
men's minds and motives. She knew very well that 
Espartero's patriotism was strangely confounded with 
a belief in his own personaHty, just as in acting for 
herself she was sure that she was acting for the good 
of Spain. Don Carlos would soon be disposed of f 

13 



194 A Queen at Bay 

and then Espartero would have to be reckoned 
with. Cristina appears to have reposed a certain 
confidence in the general ; of deliberate treason 
she believed him, and rightly, to be incapable. 
But if she was to be mistress in Spain, he must 
be attached to her side, or else a balance must be 
found for his ever-increasing power. The sagacious 
Queen resolved to adopt both measures at the same 
time. Her confidence in the Duke of Victory 
showed no signs of waning ; but the disturbed 
state of La Mancha and Andalucia was made the 
excuse for creating an imposing army of reserve, 
the command of which was given to General 
Ramon Narvaez, an officer distinguished by his 
valour and also by his enmity to Espartero. 

The Duke of Victory knew perfectly well with 
what object this army had been formed. From 
his headquarters at Logrofto on the 31st October, 
1838, he penned a passionate protest to the Queen, 
pointing out that if 40,000 men could be raised 
they could be nowhere better employed than at the 
front, and that Narvaez was an insubordinate officer, 
whose promotion was a bad example to the whole 
army. The general thus attacked replied in a 
counter-manifesto, defending himself lustily against 
his superior's allegations. He declared himself a 
citizen soldier, and a man of advanced ideas. 
Cristina and her Moderate ministers knew better. 
But when he said that the reactionary party would 
never find in him a mere instrument, he spoke more 




p. 194] 



From a lithograph by J. D. Victoria 
GENERAL NARVAEZ 



The Downfall of Cristina 195 

truly than they knew. Cristina, Espartero, and 
Narvaez were fighting for their own hands first, 
and the instrument of all was Spain. 

The Liberals were unable to place any confidence 
in Narvaez, who, rightly or wrongly, they believed 
to be essentially a Queen's man ; and when their 
attitude had become sufficiently clear, Espartero 
promptly threw the weight of his sword and his 
influence on the popular side. The Moderates 
arranged by means of agents provocateurs a feeble 
tumult at Madrid, whereupon Narvaez occupied 
and surrounded the city with his troops, to the 
indignation of the Captain-General of New Castille, 
who threw up his command. The Moderate 
ministers, having gone thus far, lost heart. To 
conciliate Espartero, they appointed General Alaix, 
one of his warmest friends, to the ministry of war. 
Cristina had made up her mind to use the two 
powerful soldiers as checks on each other. It was 
a wise selection, for their personal animosity made 
any sort of understanding between them impossible. 
Narvaez, realizing that he was merely a tool in the 
Queen's hands, retired to his native place, Loja, a 
poverty-stricken town on the road from Bobadilla 
to Granada. 

It was obvious to every one by this time that 
the Regent's heart was with the Moderates. A 
certain wing of the Liberal party began to think 
seriously of the pretensions of the amiable Infante 
Francisco de Paula, who had always affected sym- 



196 A Queen at Bay 

pathy with their views. He was not devoid of 
ambition. In the twenties, there had been some 
talk of making him Emperor of Mexico ; and 
though his Royal Highness did not venture to sail 
for that troubled region, he is said to have pocketed 
the funds subscribed for the project by his sup- 
porters there and elsewhere. By his devotion to 
the turf and interest in horse-breeding, he might 
have satisfied some people's ideals of kingship, but 
the Liberals who thought of placing him on the 
throne of Spain in 1838, were prepared to use 
him only as a cat's-paw. Espartero got wind of 
the conspiracy, and intercepted some treasonable 
correspondence at Miranda. A revolt had broken 
out at Seville, and it is asserted that its object was 
to further the Infante's designs on the crown of 
Spain, or if these should fail, to make him King 
of an independent Andalucia. This latter idea was 
the revival of a scheme which had tempted the 
Duke of Medinaceli in Felipe IV.'s time. Francisco, 
of course, publicly dissociated himself from these 
schemes, and stayed in Paris, where, however, he 
and his wife fomented discontent against his sister- 
in-law by means of a paper called El Graduador. 
The revolt at Seville was ostensibly, and in the case 
of many of its abettors was actually, a mutiny 
against the Captain-General at Cadiz. General 
Cordova, a staunch Moderate, was asked by one 
faction to intervene, and in an evil hour consented. 
He induced Narvaez to accompany him, and the 



The Downfall of Cristina 197 

two generals succeeded in pacifying the city. But 
their intervention was looked upon by Alaix as 
rebellion. The chance of shooting Espartero's 
enemy was too good *to be missed. Narvaez and 
Cordova, warned in time, took to flight, and after 
undergoing shipwreck and various vicissitudes, found 
refuge in England and at Gibraltar. Alaix promptly 
incorporated the army of reserve with Espartero's 
command. To this slight the Queen-Regent had 
to bow ; but she was true to her friends the 
Moderates, and formed a new ministry under the 
presidency of Don Lorenzo Arrazola. 

Cristina had long felt the ground shaking beneath 
her feet. Anticipating the day she should be sent 
on her travels, she hoarded up money and clutched 
at every dollar. Her name became a bye-word for 
avarice. This is the besetting sin of the Neapolitan ; 
and, to do the Regent justice, it must be said that 
it was not for herself alone that she was scheming. 
She had no repugnance, as we know, to liberal ideas, 
but she wanted to assure her position. She was an 
inverted Vicar of Bray. Whatsoever party ruled 
in Spain, she wanted to be Regent. To further 
this design, Arrazola exerted himself to secure the 
adoption of certain laws that should put the crown 
beyond the reach of popular effervescence and 
parliamentary censure. Cristina watched his efforts 
with anxiety. The new minister did not want for 
firmness. He dissolved the Cortes as soon as he 
saw they contained a Liberal majority, and did not 



198 A Queen at Bay 

scruple to interfere in the elections in order to 
secure a large measure of support in the next 
Parliament. 

But the convention of Vergara had now set 
Espartero free to take a part in domestic politics. 
In the Eco del Comercio of December 2, 1839, there 
appeared a letter, signed by his secretary, Don 
Francisco Linage, declaring that the Duke of 
Victory regarded the government's policy with 
profound disapproval. This was a definite pro- 
nouncement. Espartero, then, was on the Liberal 
side. The ministry were angry. Linage was 
ordered to appear before a court-martial at La 
Coruna. Cristina, anxious to conciliate the general, 
wrote to him, urging him to dismiss the peccant 
secretary. His Grace refused to do so, and told 
her Majesty that he would regard the disgrace of 
Linage as a personal affront. There is no reasoning 
with the master of many legions. The prosecution 
was abandoned, but Espartero, in a manifesto dated 
from the camp at Mas de Matas, reflected on the 
unwisdom of the government, and regretted that 
the Regent should have allowed herself to be misled 
by ill-disposed counsellors. Cristina tried what 
could be done by kindness. She sent the general 
a magnificent golden casket set with brilliants, worth 
six thousand dollars ; she presented him with the 
best horses in the royal stables, and loaded his 
Duchess with gems. While she undertook to con- 
ciliate the most formidable man in her dominions, 



The Downfall of Cristina 199 

her ministers resolutely pursued their work of 
amending the constitution. The success of their 
efforts depended on the passing of a bill to place 
the appointment of fhe mayors of corporations in 
the hands of the crown. The object of this 
ordinance was to enable the Government at all 
times to bring direct pressure to bear on the 
electorate. 

Cristina knew very well that the country was 
against her, and that the Moderate majority in the 
newly assembled Cortes had been obtained only 
through bribery and intimidation. Her popularity 
was waning rapidly. Her personal reputation was 
incessantly attacked in the columns of El Graduador\ 
her connection with Munoz was revealed by her 
sister to a journalist called Lopez Martinez, who 
immediately published the story in pamphlet form 
at Paris. The most violent attacks were made upon 
her in a scurrilous sheet called El Guirigay, edited 
by one Gonzalez Bravo. The journal was pro- 
secuted, but the judges would not convict, and the 
obnoxious issue had to be suppressed by the direct 
intervention of the police. In the summer of 1840, 
the Queen-Mother determined on a bold bid for 
popularity. It was announced that she and the 
ten-year-old Queen would proceed to Cataluna, one 
of the most disaffected provinces in the kingdom, 
in order to take the waters at Las Caldas and sea- 
bathing at Barcelona. In the course of the progress, 
their Majesties would meet Espartero, who had 



200 A Queen at Bay 

driven Cabrera to the foot of the Pyrenees, and 
was preparing to give him the coup -de -grace. The 
journey was not unattended with risk. Formidable 
Carhst bands still infested the country between 
Madrid and Zaragoza, and the two Queens were 
a prize that might well tempt their boldest leaders. 
One of them, Balmaseda, made ready to spring. 
He was badly defeated by General Concha, who 
commanded the royal escort, and in this supreme 
effort the Pretender's forces in central Spain were 
hopelessly broken up. Elated with this triumph, 
their Majesties made their entry into Zaragoza, 
accompanied by Espartero's Duchess. A rude shock 
awaited Cristina. The crowd cheered for her Grace 
and her victorious husband, but hardly noticed the 
Regent. The Queen kept her temper, and only 
talked the more sweetly to the Duchess of Victory. 

From the capital of Aragon, the royal party 
continued their journey towards the coast. Between 
Cervera and Tarrega, Espartero at the head of his 
army was waiting to receive them. The meeting 
was most cordial, the Queen's manner towards her 
most brilliant officer almost affectionate. His address 
breathed a spirit of fervent loyalty. He invited her 
Majesty to put herself at the head of the troops, 
and to assist in person at the final overthrow of 
her daughter's enemies. Cristina, now confident of 
the general's loyalty, was moved to tears. Turning 
to one of her ministers, she said reproachfully, 
" Did I not tell you so ? " The statesman was 



The Downfall of Cristina 201 

silent. He had heard and read of such protestations 
by ambitious soldiers. 

Their Majesties reviewed the troops, who marched 
past cheering for Isabel II. and the constitution of 
1837. Espartero rode beside the Regent's carriage 
on the way to Barcelona. He seized the opportunity 
to discuss the municipalities bill, and urged the 
Queen to refuse her assent to it. She waived the 
subject, but asked him to accept the presidency of 
the ministry himself. Espartero considered. This 
might be an attempt to remove him from the 
command of the army, or to identify him with the 
unpopular measure in contemplation. He thanked 
her Majesty, and said he would accept the presidency 
as soon as he had finally disposed of Cabrera. At 
Esparraguera Queen and general parted seemingly 
the best of friends. 

At Barcelona the sovereigns received a right royal 
welcome. ''What think you of our entry now?" 
Cristina exultingly asked a pessimistic officer. He 
sagely replied that he would wait to see what her 
exit was like before pronouncing an opinion. There 
were ominous discordant notes in the ovation. The 
corporation had the bad taste, says a Conservative 
writer, to introduce into the decorations the texts 
of the clauses in the constitution guaranteeing the 
freedom of the municipalities. The Queen frowned 
and became more thoughtful. 

She soon found that she had walked into the 
lions' den. The municipality and the vast mass 



202 A Queen at Bay 

of the population of the city were devoted to the 
constitution and strenuously hostile to the policy of 
the government. Van Halen, the Captain-General, 
was Espartero's man. The only elements in Barce- 
lona on which the Regent could rely were the 
aristocracy and professional classes, from which the 
urban militia, thanks to the precautions of the late 
governor, was exclusively drawn. It was impossible 
for the Queen to drive out without being reminded, 
often most emphatically, of the people's repugnance 
to her ministers' measures. It was not without 
relief that she heard of the approach of Espartero, 
fresh from the crowning mercy of Berga. On the 
13th July, he entered the city, clad in the splendid 
uniform of a Captain-General, and attended by a 
brilliant staff. The people went mad with joy. 
The warmth of his reception eclipsed that of the 
Queens. Cristina looked on, and smiled wonder- 
ingly. The corporation, in an address presented to 
the hero, expressed the hope that he would not 
sheathe his sword while the constitution was in 
danger. Espartero replied that it should not be 
endangered while he lived, and called for cheers 
for the constitution pure and simple. That night 
Barcelona was delirious with joy. The ministers 
in attendance on the Queens swore that the 
only crown the general should wear would be one 
of thorns. 

Cristina received the popular hero in private 
audience. He exhorted her to take heed of the 



The Downfall of Cristina 203 

unmistakable opposition of the vast mass of the 
people to the municipalities bill. It would mean a 
revolution. The Regent replied by asking him to 
form a ministry, as he had agreed to do upon his 
return from the campaign. The general was willing 
to fulfil his promise, providing the royal assent 
was withheld from the obnoxious act. Without 
having given a decisive answer, the Queen dismissed 
him. Her obstinacy in this matter is a little per- 
plexing. She was not ignorant of the forces behind 
Espartero, of the excited state of Spain. But she 
was unaccustomed, as most sovereigns were in 1 840, 
to being a constitutional monarch, and saw in the 
unrestricted freedom of the people to choose their 
own representatives a constant peril to the crown. 
The same dread cost Charles X. of France his 
throne. Yet Cristina hesitated, more out of respect 
for Espartero than of fear of the people. At that 
moment the bill arrived from Madrid ready for 
her signature. It was laid before her at a cabinet 
council. Her Majesty repeated the objections of 
the Duke of Victory. The ministers listened in 
scornful silence. Twice she took up the pen, to let 
it fall again. *' Who is sovereign here, madame ? *' 
asked Perez de Castro, " you or Espartero ? " The 
taunt roused all the proud, masterful Bourbon 
humour. Cristina signed, and the bill was law. 

Within a few hours, she received a letter from 
Espartero. He tendered the resignation of all his 
dignities and offices, and sought permission to retire 



204 A Queen at Bay 

into private life. Cristina assumed a most royal 
attitude. She refused to accept the proffered re- 
signation, and coolly reminded her officer that he 
was commander of her guard and must attend to 
the safety of her person. This brought Espartero 
to the palace. He persisted in his resignation, since 
he could not approve the Queen's measures. *' But 
I may want you to preserve order," argued her 
Majesty. The general answered that it was absurd 
to ask him to repress a movement of dissent with 
which he was in sympathy ; moreover, he did 
not think the troops would fire on the people in 
case of a revolt. '' Very well," said Cristina hotly, 
" go when you like." And the Duke of Victory 
withdrew. 

His dismissal was the signal for the expected 
explosion. Barcelona is used to the business of 
insurrection, and in a few hours barricades were 
thrown up in the principal streets. Angry mobs 
traversed the city from end to end, yelling " Down 
with the ministers ! Hurrah for Espartero ! 
Hurrah for the constitution ! " The ministers, 
mindful of the fate of Bassa and Quesada, fled in 
disguise to a French vessel in the harbour. Cristina, 
thus deserted, implored Espartero to come to her. 
He exerted himself to calm the people, and pro- 
ceeded to the palace. He refused to accept the 
presidency of the council himself, but recommended 
her some new ministers in whom he was able to 
place confidence. The Queen at once nominated 



The Downfall of Cristina 205 

them to the vacant offices. Their appointment did 
not at once allay the tumult. There were some 
Moderates in Barcelona, and they collected outside 
the palace and cheere^d for the Queen. She acknow- 
ledged their encouragement with smiles and bows. 
These demonstrations cost her sympathizers dear. 
Don Francisco Balmes, one of the leading Moderates 
of Barcelona, was met next day near his house by 
a band of workmen, who pointed him out as a 
political opponent. *' We will make you suffer for 
yesterday's demonstration ! " they threatened. By 
way of answer, the hot-headed Balmes shot one of 
the men dead, and then, pursued by the others, 
took refuge in his own house. Barricading the 
doors, he defended himself against an armed mob 
for several hours, his unerring marksmanship keeping 
them at a distance. At last the fire ceased. The 
boldest of the assailants broke down the door, and, 
rushing upstairs, found their intended victim dead. 
He had blown out his brains with his last cartridge. 
Not to be balked of their vengeance, the crowd 
repeated the scenes of horror that had followed 
the murders of Quesada and Bassa. They paraded 
the brave man's mutilated corpse round the town, 
till it was rescued from them by some indignant 
militia officers. 

Cristina meanwhile was closeted with her new 
ministers, a number of mediocrities, whose selection 
does not reflect much credit on Espartero's sagacity 
or insight into character. They could only repeat 



2o6 A Queen at Bay 

the warning of their master that the promulgation 
of the municipalities bill would mean the overthrow 
of authority. The Queen must suspend the bill 
by royal decree, or else dissolve the Cortes and 
summon another. Her Majesty would do neither. 
The bill had been passed by both Houses of Parlia- 
ment and been signed by her : it was now part of 
the law of Spain. It was beyond her power to 
cancel it. Nor could she, according to law, dissolve 
the Cortes twice in the same year. " You clamoured 
for a constitution," she might have said, *' and I 
shall hold to it religiously." Legally, she was 
wholly in the right. Then the ministers resigned 
in despair, one or two of them consenting to retain 
their portfolios till successors were appointed. Again 
the Regent turned to Espartero, who refused to help 
her. She ordered him to dispose of the military 
forces of the kingdom as he deemed best for the 
safety of the state ; and then, fearing some palace 
revolution like that of La Granja, she sailed to 
Valencia. 

She was received with chilling silence. Leopold 
O'Donnell, the general in command of the garrison, 
was on her side, but was not sure of his troops. 
She was attacked in the local press, and when a 
few of the Moderates of the city tried to serenade 
her, they were driven away from the front of the 
palace by the Liberals. Cristina had at last 
succeeded in forming another cabinet. It was 
composed of men, Moderates indeed, but who 



The Downfall of Cristina 207 

had given unmistakable proofs of their attachment 
to constitutional government. They accepted office 
on the understanding, cordially entered into by 
the Regent, that thfe Cortes should be asked to 
amend the bill which was the cause of all the 
mischief. 

But the new Ministry had a short lease of life. 
On September i, Madrid rose in insurrection. A 
Junta was formed, and the penalty of death was 
decreed against any one who should obey the orders 
of the government at Valencia. The municipality 
and the miHtia made common cause. Spain would 
not have the bill in any shape or form. Don 
Manuel Cortina, one of the ablest advocates in 
the capital, was sent to negotiate with Espartero. 
Cristina, hearing of the rebellion, ordered the general 
to march upon Madrid and to restore order. He 
replied in a long letter dated from Barcelona, 
September 7, 1840. The Junta of Madrid, he 
pointed out, had declared for Isabel II., the regency 
of Cristina, the constitution, and liberty. This 
formula embodied his own political creed, and he 
declined to draw the sword against his fellow-patriots. 
Nothing would tranquillize the country short of a 
declaration from the Regent that the constitution 
would be respected, the municipalities bill with- 
drawn, and a ministry formed composed of Liberal 
counsellors, "pure, just, and wise." 

The publication of this document led all the cities 
of Spain to make common cause with Madrid. The 



2o8 A Queen at Bay 

authority of the Regent was limited to the city of 
Valencia, where O'Donnell secured respect for her 
name. In desperation Cristina again invited Espar- 
tero to assume the premiership. This time he 
accepted. But he proceeded first to Madrid, where 
he came to an understanding with the leaders of 
the Junta. He found that the regency of Cristina 
was not regarded as an essential part of their pro- 
gramme. It was time, the papers said, to finish 
with her ; no more faith could be placed in her or 
in ministers appointed by her. The Duke of 
Victory was already saluted as the saviour of his 
country. Having formed his ministry, his Grace 
travelled with them to Valencia, where they arrived 
on October 8. Cristina received them at eleven 
o'clock at night. She at once asked them for a 
draft of their programme. The new ministers 
looked at Espartero and each other. Their views, 
the Duke answered, were so well known to her 
Majesty that it had not been thought necessary 
to set them out on paper. " No," said the Queen, 
" I must have a draft of your proposals." She 
was well advised, and had evidently been warned 
that the new cabinet proposed to go beyond the 
formula endorsed by Espartero. 

The ministers were received next night, and 
Cortina read the programme. The proposal to 
submit the bill to a new Cortes came as no surprise 
to the Queen ; but the document went on to say 
that the ministers would propose that the Regent 



The Downfall of Cristina 209 

should graciously accept the co-operation of some 
other person or persons in the onerous task of 
government. Cortina finished and glanced at the 
Queen. She betrayed no emotion, and handed 
them the crucifix on which they took the oaths of 
allegiance. Her answer, she said, would be com- 
municated to them at the same hour the following 
night. The ministers had no sooner withdrawn 
than Espartero was recalled to the presence. Cristina 
announced her resolution. She would abdicate the 
regency and leave Spain. The general appeared 
to be petrified with astonishment. The Queen 
observed that he could hardly be surprised at her 
decision, since he could have expected no other 
answer to the document he had had a share in 
drafting. It was insulting to her dignity, she com- 
plained. Espartero protested that nothing could 
have been further from his thoughts or from those 
of his colleagues to offer the least slight to her 
Majesty. " My determination, all the same, is 
irrevocable/' said Cristina. " I ask you only to be 
loyal to my daughter, and to give me your word 
of honour to be true to her." All the general's 
remonstrances were unavailing, and he hurried 
off to communicate this startling news to his 
colleagues. 

Capable of high courage at the critical moment, 
Cristina always broke down when the immediate 
stress of danger was removed. Left with her 
husband and intimate attendants, she wept bitterly. 

14 



210 A Queen at Bay 

She repeated over and over again the sentences in 
the ministerial programme which appeared to reflect 
on her capacity. That night, says Bermejo, a soldier 
offered his life and sword in her service. Probably 
it was Leopold O'Donnell. From Narvaez, too, 
came a letter, offering his devotion. Munoz tried 
to dissuade his wife from her resolution. All was 
in vain. Her presence in Spain jeopardized her 
daughter's throne, and she would go. She ordered 
Pacheco, one of the most bitter enemies of the 
Liberals, to draw up her parting manifesto. Next 
day, the ministers assembled. Cristina entered, 
smiled and bowed. She unlocked a drawer in her 
bureau, and having produced a paper, handed it 
to Cortina. The minister scanned it, and handed 
it back. " Madam.e," he said, " I recognize the 
authorship of this document. It is unworthy of your 
Majesty, and will give dire offence to the Spanish 
people." " Never mind," replied Cristina, " publish 
it." " Your Majesty has forgotten that your 
daughters must remain on Spanish soil." The Queen 
started. " True," she said ; " you are right." She 
thrust the paper into a drawer, and told Cortina 
himself to prepare her manifesto. 

The difficulty was to find a plausible excuse for 
the Queen's act. The minister saw her privately. 
He suggested that if her Majesty would confirm 
a certain rumour, that would be an admirable 
explanation. *' To what rumour do you refer ^ " 
asked Cristina, affecting not to understand him. 



The Downfall of Cristina 211 

** That which says your Majesty has contracted ties, 
which you are free as a widow to do, but which 
would incapacitate you from the regency." " It is 
not true," angrily replied the Queen. Cortina 
looked at her. "Not true.?" "No, it is not 
true ! '* The minister could say no more, and at 
last they agreed upon the text of the document. 
" I would rather tear it up," said Cortina before 
he read it. " No," said Cristina wearily, " I've 
identified myself with a party, and that makes my 
government impossible in Spain. Espartero has 
made the same mistake." 

On the 1 2th October, the ministers and principal 
authorities of Valencia assembled in the audience 
chamber. Cristina, gracious and affable, splendidly 
dressed, read her act of renunciation. It ran: "The 
state of the nation and the condition of my health 
oblige me, despite the earnest remonstrances of 
my ministers, to resign the regency " ; it being 
impossible for her, she went on to state, to accede 
to the wishes of the people as at present expressed. 
Her august daughters she recommended to the 
persons to be appointed by the Cortes. 

She signed the paper, stepped down from the 
throne, and, in her old queenly way, swept into 
a room beyond. Espartero took the document to 
a side table, and witnessed it. Then with his 
colleagues he followed the ex-Regent, and found her 
turning over the pages of a magazine with affected 
composure. 



212 A Queen at Bay 

When they had gone her emotion escaped from 
control. She wept tears of grief and rage, and 
producing from a drawer a file of newspapers and 
pamphlets, she expressed her ardent desire to leave 
a country where she had been thus vilified. Against 
Espartero she displayed no malice. The courtiers 
attacked him, but she said a word in his defence. 
*^ He is a man of honour, and even now I could 
win him over to my side. But enough blood 
has been shed in Spain. Better times are in 
store. Espartero's fall, mark you, will be soon 
and rapid." 

The little Queen and her sister could not under- 
stand why their mother should leave them. They 
cried bitterly, and implored her to take them with 
her. At the request of the ministers she deferred 
her departure till the 17th October. With frantic 
kisses and sobs, she tore herself away from her 
little girls. She wished to ahght on her way to 
the harbour to hear Mass at the church of the 
Virgen de los Desamparados, but her desire was 
overruled, Cortina warning her that some of her 
partisans might endeavour to prevent her departure, 
should such an opportunity occur. At half-past six 
in the morning she went aboard the steamship 
Mercurio, escorted by the ministers, while the guns 
thundered the respect that Spain did not feel for 
the widow of Fernando VII. Again she adjured 
Espartero to stand by her daughters, and begged 
him not to persecute the men who had attached 



The Downfall of Cristina 213 

themselves to her cause : " They are not many/* 
she sighed, thinking at this last moment how few of 
the great party to which she had sacrificed herself 
had stood by her.* And so ended the regency of 
Cristina de Bourbon. 



CHAPTER XII 

CRISTINA IN EXILE 

THE good ship Mercurio steamed into Port 
Vendres on the night of the i8th October. 
Cristina's first care on landing was to write to 
Espartero, recommending the officers of the vessel for 
promotion and begging for news of her daughters. 
Then she set out for Marseille, over the road she 
had come eleven years before as the affianced bride 
of Fernando VII. At Perpignan and Narbonne 
she was received with military honours. She reached 
Montpellier in the afternoon, and stopped for three 
hours at the Hotel du Midi. By an odd coincidence, 
the Carlist refugee Cabrera was in the town, and 
from the balcony of his lodgings feasted his eyes 
on his foe, now forced like him into exile. Cristina, 
femme jusquau bout des ongles^ saw nothing either 
dramatic or mortifying in the encounter, but was 
childishly curious to see the redoubtable chief, and 
on resuming her journey, thrust her head out of 
the window to have a good look at him. She 
reached Nimes late that night (21st October), as 
an Englishman, staying at the Hotel du Luxem- 

214 



Cristina in Exile 215 

bourg, informs us, through the columns of 'The 
Times} He goes on to say : " The best apartments 
in the hotel were already taken by an English 
family, which had already retired to rest, so that 
Cristina and her suite were obliged to content 
themselves with second-rate apartments. 

" The suite was certainly not a very splendid 
one, for the whole cortege was only composed of 
two carriages, and the vehicle of the Queen looked 
more like an English waggon or a French diligence 
than a royal carriage. 

" This morning, after breakfasting a la fourchette 
at eleven o'clock, her ex-Majesty and suite took 
the railway as far as Tarascon, on their way to 
Marseille, their ultimate destination being Naples. 
The last occasion on which I had seen her was at 
the Cascine at Florence in the month of September 
1829, when she was on her way to marry Fernando. 
She was then a thin but beautiful young woman. 
Eleven years have since passed, and though still fresh 
and beautiful, she has grown into an embonpoint, 
which, though not disagreeable to me, is distasteful 
to many. 

** For the rest, she is just as gay and degagee 
as she was eleven years ago. It is the same free- 
spoken and frank Neapolitan with the laughing 
eye and strenuous solicitude to please, which I saw 
in fair Florence, and perhaps time has in some 
respects imparted additional graces. 
' Times ^ 28th October, 1840, 



2i6 A Queen at Bay 

" Maria Cristina was accompanied by a dame 
d'honneur, an aide-de-camp (a good-looking young 
man), and a general officer. [One of these must 
have been Munoz.] She arrived here with a fat 
almoner, with a face of contented ignorance, but 
his reverence has already deserted fallen royalty, 
and starts to-morrow for Lyon. 

'* The arrival of so fine a woman has put all the 
commercial travellers at all the hotels on the qui 
vivCy but now that she has gone these infamous, 
profligate, and abandoned scamps [!] give their 
tongues a license, for which their bodies politic 
merit a cooling in the nearest horsepond. 

'* The days of chivalry in France at least are gone, 
and I fear never to return. Cristina embarks on a 
Neapolitan steamer at Marseille for Naples. I learn 
that her wish was to proceed to Paris, but she has 
been overruled." 

Notwithstanding the decline of chivalry, her 
Majesty had no reason to complain of her reception 
at Aries, where she " did " the sights most con- 
scientiously, or at Marseille, where a special guard of 
honour was told off to attend her. Glad apparently 
of this opportunity of seeing the world, she ran over 
to Toulon, where she was shown over the fleet and 
welcomed with naval and military honours. On 
her return to Marseille, she had interesting news. 
The cabinet of Spain had constituted itself into 
a provisional regency, Espartero at its head, and 
had summoned the Cortes to meet the following 



Cristina in Exile 217 

March. More important still were the tidings 
from Paris. M. Thiers had resigned, and the new 
ministry, formed by M. Guizot, was composed of 
men likely to be more sympathetic with her than 
with the new government at Madrid. She also 
found awaiting her her faithful knight the Marques 
de Miraflores, who had resigned his post of 
ambassador to the French court, and now came 
to offer his services to his beloved mistress. 
Cristina poured her sorrows into her old friend's 
ears, bursting into tears in the middle of the recital. 
The Marquis, also, was deeply moved. He was of 
opinion that, while her Majesty could abdicate the 
regency of her own free will, she remained bound 
to watch over her daughter's throne and to intervene 
at any moment that daughter's interests appeared 
to be imperilled. He drafted a manifesto, stating 
these views, which he urged the Queen to sign. 
He also counselled her to proceed at once to Paris 
to take advantage of the favourable change in the 
ministry ; and sure enough, before he had gone to 
prepare for her journey, the Comte d'Houdetot 
presented himself with letters from Louis Philippe 
to his wife's niece, couched in the warmest terms. 

Another old friend now came to pay his respects 
to fallen royalty — Cea Bermudez, of " enlightened 
despotism " fame. He had a rare opportunity of 
saying " I told you so," but as he remained on 
good terms with Cristina, we must suppose he said 
no such thing. Instead he drew up a manifesto to 



2i8 A Queen at Bay 

the Spanish nation, which was published over the 
Queen's signature at Marseille on the 8th November. 
Cristina expressed her unalterable affection for the 
people of Spain, and begged to remind them that 
she had persuaded her late husband to reopen the 
universities and to pardon many hundreds of 
political offenders ; that she had, of her own free 
will, decreed a constitution, and, when it was found 
that the nation was not satisfied with that, had 
solemnly subscribed to the constitution of 1837. To 
that she had been scrupulously faithful, refusing to 
suspend a law that had been passed by both Houses 
of Parliament ; this she could not have done without 
acknowledging the right of force, " which is not 
recognized either by divine or human laws, and the 
existence of which is incompatible with our con- 
stitution as with all constitutions " ; in conclusion, 
Cristina drew an affecting picture of her own 
bereaved condition, but disclaimed with horror any 
intention of troubling the peace of Spain. 

In the light of after-events, no great sagacity is re- 
vealed in this document. The definite disclaimer was 
unwise and unnecessary. If, too, the manifesto was 
designed to enlist sympathy and to disarm the 
suspicions of the Madrid government, it would 
have been better to have left out all allusion to the 
immediate causes of the Queen's abdication. The 
declaration suggested by Miraflores strikes as much 
better conceived. The Provisional Government of 
Spain replied a week later, traversing most of the 



Cristina in Exile 219 

Queen's contentions, and deploring the retirement 
of a Princess, from whom much good might have 
been expected, had she been able to ignore con- 
siderations of party. 

Before this rejoinder met her eyes, Cristina was 
on her way to Paris. She travelled vid Lyon, the 
inundation of the Rhone having rendered the usual 
route by Valence impracticable. In the French 
capital her husband awaited her, and the children 
born of their union, the eldest of whom she had 
not seen for nearly three years. In the society of 
her dear ones, and in the enjoyment of her 
colossal fortune, she might forget the stormy days 
of her regency. Louis Philippe, accompanied by 
his wife and daughters and the Due d'Aumale, came 
out to Fontainebleau to meet her. At four o'clock 
on the 20th November, she drove into the Cour 
du Cheval Blanc, escorted by a squadron of the 
6th Dragoons. On entering the palace she was 
affectionately greeted by the old King, on whose 
arm she ascended the grand staircase, to be embraced 
by her aunt Marie Amelie, whom she had not 
met since 1829. Her arrival was the occasion of 
a banquet at the early hour of six, when she sat 
in the place of honour on the King's right. 

" Queen Cristina," said a reporter on this occasion, 
'' is of medium height. She has a beautiful face. 
Her eyes are of remarkable vivacity." (''Thirsting 
for pleasure," as they were described by Princess 
Clementine.) ** Her expression exhibits a gentle 



220 A Queen at Bay 

firmness blended with charming grace. The calm 
strength and keenness revealed by her countenance 
explain how this woman has been able to struggle 
during ten years against the audacity, the malice, 
and the cunning of the political party which now 
exploits Spain — how this Queen abandoned her 
authority rather than abuse it." 

Her Majesty's reception by the public on the 
road to Paris was hardly less sympathetic than the 
'Journal des T)ebats, On Sunday afternoon, the 
royal cortege, escorted by dragoons and mounted 
national guards, drove to the Palais Royal. Im- 
mense crowds lined the quays. On arriving, the 
King of the French himself conducted the exiled 
Queen to the apartments prepared for her in the 
left wing of the palace, between the garden and the 
Rue de Nemours. The Dukes of Orleans and 
Montpensier, with Marshal Soult, Guizot, and her 
own ex-ministers, were all there to welcome her. 
Even her detested sister and brother-in-law, Francisco 
de Paula, thought fit, for the sake of appearances, to 
wait upon her, and were invited by the good old 
Citizen King to dine with her at the Tuileries that 
evening. I imagine that the Queen was glad when 
all these festivities were over, and she could steal 
away to the babies from whom she had been so long 
separated. 

Never was there so indefatigable a sightseer as 
Cristina. During this, her first visit to the Ville 
Lumi^re, she went everywhere and saw everything. 



Cristina in Exile 221 

The newly opened railway to Versailles greatly 
interested her ; nor did she neglect the National 
Library, where this record of her doings has been in J 
great part prepared. It is certain notwithstanding 
that she found time for consultation with the sage 
King of the French, with his astute minister, and 
her own advisers. Espartero had avowed himself 
a staunch friend of England, and his accession to 
power could not, therefore, be regarded with favour 
by France. Louis Philippe and Guizot, in modern 
phrase, went solid for Cristina, and deterred her 
from visiting London as Miraflores had suggested 
she should do. No definite policy could be formu- 
lated till the Spanish Cortes had met, and the still 
uncertain position of Espartero was determined. 
Probably upon the advice of her host, the exiled 
Queen determined to employ the interval in enlisting 
the sympathies of the Italian courts, which had 
hitherto been hostile to her. 

Leaving Paris on 12th December, she travelled 
post to Leghorn. There she took ship for Civita 
Vecchia, and reached Rome on Christmas Eve, 
1840. She put up at the Hotel de Serny in the 
Piazza di Spagna. Her reception by the Papal 
authorities disposed her to believe that her overtures 
would be acceptable to his Holiness. Gregory XVI., 
who then filled the chair of Peter, had been among 
the first sovereigns to recognize Don Carlos as King 
of Spain, and had even accredited a Nuncio to his 
court at Estella. But the Pretender^s hopes were 



222 A Queen at Bay 

finally shattered ; and the anti-clerical policy of the 
Provisional Government of Madrid made the Pope 
glad of a new ally. He received the ex-Regent in 
audience on the 30th December ; the conversation 
was brief, but it was resumed, and more intently, 
when news came that Arellano, the Pope's charge 
d'affaires at Madrid, had been put across the frontier 
with almost brutal want of ceremony by order 
of Espartero. Great was Gregory's wrath, and 
the angrier he became with this upstart soldier- 
regent, the more kindly did he feel towards the 
mother of Isabel II. Cristina bided her time, and 
remained in the Eternal City, edifying the clergy 
by her piety and ultramontane sentiments. The 
news of her regeneration reached Naples, and 
her brother, the pious Bomba, cordially invited her 
to visit him. He offered to place the Palazzo 
Chiatamone at her disposal. " Come back," he 
wrote to the prodigal ; " all is forgiven — even your 
wickedness in upholding your daughter's rights." 
The Queen thought, however, she had more to 
gain by conciliating the Supreme Pontiff. On the 
1st March, Gregory pronounced an allocution on 
the affairs of Spain, which was not unfairly described 
in a French newspaper as an incitement to revolt. 
The faithful were invited to treat all the acts of the 
government since Fernando's death, as they affected 
the Church, as null and void. It is to be hoped 
that the Pope took this step on his own initiative, 
not urged thereto by those anxious to undermine 



Cristina in Exile 223 

the authority of the existing Spanish government 
in every possible way. Cristina determined, at all 
events, to lose nothing by this appeal to Catholic 
feeling. In the presence of his Holiness, she recited 
and signed an act of repentance for having given her 
consent to the laws of 1835, suppressing religious 
communities ; and was then solemnly relieved of all 
ecclesiastical censures, explicit or implicit. The 
Papal absolution is believed also to have covered 
certain canonical informalities incident to her second 
marriage. These probably weighed heavily on the 
mind of Cristina, affecting as they would the status 
of her younger children. Though very far from 
religious, she possessed a good share of the native 
superstition of the Neapolitan, and a flaw in her 
marriage lines would in her eyes have made all the 
difference between good and evil. Her public re- 
cantation of her errors as a ruler shows that she was 
bidding for the support of the reactionary and con- 
servative elements in Spain, though as she also was 
an exile, it is not clear why she should have hoped 
they would prefer her as a leader to Don Carlos. 
In the long run this abject submission to the Papacy 
seems to have had little effect on her affairs, one 
way or another. 

Resuming her incognito, the Queen turned her 
face northwards, and in ten days accomplished the 
journey from Rome to Milan, where she arrived 
on the 30th March. The Austrian authorities, now 
that she was purged of her liberalism, received her 



224 A Queen at Bay 

with all honour. The attentions of a guard of 
honour she gracefully declined, but she assisted de- 
lightedly at a gala performance at the Scala. From 
Lombardy she proceeded to Turin, in pursuance 
of her scheme of conciliating the Courts hitherto 
most devoted to the interests of Don Carlos. The 
marriage of Isabel and Carlos Luis was again talked 
of. Meanwhile, in Spain, the nation was divided 
on the question of the regency. Was it to be 
exercised by one, three, or five persons ? Cristina 
wrote to a politician in her confidence at Madrid, 
expressing her desire that there should be but one 
Regent, and that Espartero ; *' that this should be so, 
it is necessary to exert oneself. The good which may 
result will be immense." It is not easy to fathom 
the Queen^s policy at this juncture. She may have 
cherished certain hopes concerning Espartero ; she 
may have thought that a multiple regency would 
accustom the nation to the idea of a republic ; most 
probable of all, she dreaded lest the regency should 
fall into the hands of the detested Francisco de 
Paula, who had already claimed the guardianship 
of Queen Isabel as her uncle and natural protector. 
Her instructions were evidently understood by her 
party, for in the Cortes, which must necessarily have 
contained many of her secret adherents, only three 
votes were given to her against 103 to Arguelles 
and 179 to Espartero. The General became sole 
Regent of Spain. 

Cristina heard the news on her return to France 




From a lithograph after the painting by D, Vicente Lope? 
ISABEL II. 

IN 1842 



p. 334] 



Cristina in Exile 225 

in the middle of May. It was rumoured that she 
would pass the summer in Switzerland, but after 
a stay of some days at, Lyon, she went on to Paris, 
where she was lodged as before at the Palais Royal. 
She soon, however, made a home for herself in a 
palace in the Rue de Courcelles, where all her old 
friends gathered round her. The news that Arguelles 
— one of the noblest and most upright men in 
Spain — had been named by Espartero governor or 
tutor of the young Queen, stirred her into action. 
On the 19th July, 1841, she addressed a protest to 
the Spanish nation, claiming that the guardianship of 
her infant daughters was hers by every law human 
and divine ; that it was expressly reserved to her 
by the will of her late husband ; and that the 
Cortes had no power under the constitution or by 
the law of Spain to take away her right. This 
protest she accompanied by a letter to Espartero, 
arguing that her renunciation of the regency was 
never meant to imply the abandonment of her 
maternal rights, and reproaching him with this 
outrage on the principles of religion and humanity. 
Both documents were addressed to Don Baldomero 
Espartero, his dignity and authority as Regent of 
Spain being deliberately ignored. The protest was 
published, notwithstanding, in the official gazette 
of Madrid, together with the government's reply. 
It was contended that by her voluntary abdication 
of the regency and withdrawal from the kingdom, 
the Queen-Mother had in fact resigned the guar- 

15 



226 A Queen at Bay 

dianship of her daughters, and attention was drawn 
to the concluding words of her manifesto of the 
8th November : '' She who was Queen of Spain now 
asks only that you love her children and respect 
her memory." 

But that manifesto had been drawn up before 
Louis Philippe and Guizot had held out to Cristina 
hopes of restoring her to power, before she had 
obtained assurances of sympathy from the Pope and 
the Italian powers. Her Majesty, it may have 
been noted, was not more distinguished than other 
royal persons for the rigidity of her principles, 
and by consistency, '' that bugbear of small minds," 
she was troubled little. " 'Tis not I that change, 
but circumstance," she might have said. But though 
she had in fact abandoned her maternal duties 
when she left Spain, she probably felt, like most 
parents, that her maternal rights were another 
matter ; and that the appointment of a guardian 
in her room was erecting between her and her 
children a barrier where hitherto there had only been 
a void. Up till now, she had maintained a pretty 
constant correspondence with her daughters through 
the medium of persons about the palace ; but these 
were all supplanted now by creatures chosen by 
Arguelles on account of their probity, learning, 
rectitude, and other uncomfortable qualities. The 
young Queen would surely be taught to despise 
her mother, and to neglect the cult of medals, relics, 
and scapulars in which Neapolitan religion largely 



Cristina in Exile 227 

consists. Instead, Arguelles was capable of pro- 
posing the great heathens of antiquity as models 
to his august charge. .Poor Cristina was consumed 
by direful forebodings. She dreaded, too, that her 
odious sister might acquire some ascendency over 
Isabel. Francisco de Paula had been mean enough 
to write to Espartero congratulating him on his 
appointment to the regency ; whereupon Luisa 
Carlota had delightedly exclaimed, " That will put 
an end to Cristina' s manifestos and pretensions ! " 
From her modest establishment in the Rue des 
Dames Augustines, the Infanta had, moreover, 
written to her royal niece, warning her against her 
mother, and proposing her as an awful example 
of depravity. The poor child must have been 
distracted by these violent and recriminatory letters 
from her mother and aunt, pressed into her hand 
at odd moments, with furtive smiles and signs, by 
persons in her entourage. To all that Arguelles 
put an end ; so that, thanks to his tutelage, Cristina 
in reality stood less chance now than before of 
losing her daughters' affections. 

It was now open war between the Queen-Mother 
and the Regent of Spain. Her Majesty's protest 
was formally communicated by her agent, the Comte 
de Colombi, to the various courts of Europe ; her 
council sat daily in the palace in the Rue de 
Courcelles. A venerable Cardinal invoked the bless- 
ings of Heaven upon Cristina and her followers. 
Espartero, hearing these things, became spiteful. 



228 A Queen at Bay 

He had already given publicity to the story of his 
rival's secret marriage ; now he refused his assent 
to a bill settling a pension on the widow of 
Fernando VII. But Cristina's war-chest was well 
supplied. Money does not slip through Italian 
fingers ; and the five millions left by her first 
husband had been added to by the fortunate specu- 
lations of the second, and supplemented by the 
comfortable salary of ^450,000 per annum she had 
drawn while Regent of Spain. 

All through the summer of 1841, she carried 
on a systematic campaign against the new govern- 
ment. Special efforts were made to win over 
deputies and military men. Louis Philippe and his 
minister were undoubtedly privy to all Cristina's 
plans. In August Guizot thought victory was 
in sight. He wrote to his master (August 6, 
1 841) as follows: *' It is greatly to be desired 
that the friends of Queen Cristina should remain 
quiet and leave the government of the actual Regent 
to follow the course of its own errors and the 
destinies they will produce. It goes down visibly. 
M. Cea is strongly penetrated with these ideas, and 
Queen Cristina is, I believe, well disposed to adopt 
them." At an interview at Saint Cloud, Louis 
Philippe discussed the situation with the Queen, and 
found, as is minister had said, that she was pre- 
pared to await the course of events a little while 
longer. A few days later Guizot suggested sending 
an envoy to Madrid, lest the French government 



Cristina in Exile 229 

should have the air, as he put it, of abandoning 
" this poor little Queen, who has near her neither 
mother nor gouvernanie, nor any faithful and de- 
voted servant." The person who was thus to be 
at once an ambassador and a mother to the young 
Isabel, was the late Minister of Public Instruction, 
M. de Salvandy. His appointment was approved 
by the Queen-Mother, though she observed that, 
in recognizing the regency of Espartero, "the King, 
her uncle, was less Cristino than she could have 
wished " ; but (adds Guizot) " she was one of those 
who knew how to yield without renouncing their 
opinions." 

Despite her ostensible adoption of a passive policy, 
Cristina had reason to hope that, by the time 
the French envoy reached Madrid, he would find 
a government of her own choosing in possession. 
Among the officers who had followed her into exile 
was the gallant Leopold O'Donnell, a hero of the 
Carlist war and one of Espartero's ablest lieutenants. 
His merits were so conspicuous that in 1839 ^^ 
attained the rank of Captain-General, though he 
had not completed his thirtieth year. Certainly 
with Cristina's knowledge, probably with her tacit 
approval, the young general left Paris, determined 
to bring the government of Espartero to an end. 
He obtained possession of the citadel of Pamplona 
without firing a shot. Dressed as a civilian and 
accompanied by a dozen officers, he walked into the 
barrack yard on the ist October, and persuaded 



230 A Queen at Bay 

the garrison to recognize him as Captain- General 
of Navarra, and to acclaim Cristina Queen-Regent 
of Spain. The troops in the town refused their 
adhesion to the reactionary movement, but left 
O'Donnell practically unmolested. Meanwhile, Don 
Manuel Montes de Oca set up a provisional govern- 
ment in the name of the Queen-Mother at Vitoria, 
where he had the support of the municipal authorities 
and the military ; and both generals made strenuous 
appeals to the Basques and Navarrese to arm in 
defence o( thQir fueros, which her Majesty guaranteed 
on her royal word, and which the so-called Liberal 
government of Madrid was conspiring to take away. 
These demonstrations were part of an elaborate 
scheme, which was to include risings in all the 
principal towns of Spain, culminating at Madrid 
in the seizure of the young Queen's person. The 
execution of this desperate venture was undertaken 
by two brilliant young generals, Concha and Leon. 
The enterprise had in it no likelihood of success, 
but its mere daring captivated the two officers, 
in whom the instinct of self-preservation appears 
to have been suspended. On the yth October, 
Concha went at five o'clock in the afternoon to 
the quarters of his old regiment, the Princess's 
Chasseurs. Calling together the officers, he appealed 
to them to assist him in restoring the authority of 
the Queen- Regent, the illustrious Cristina. One 
alone responded — Lieutenant Manuel Boria, who 
stepped forward, brandishing his sword, and cried, 



Cristina in Exile 231 

" To arms, Princess's ! to the rescue of our Queen ! " 
Upwards of three hundred men fell in behind him. 
The rest of the regiment, probably not unwillingly, 
allowed themselves to be disarmed and confined to 
barracks. The Guards locked themselves in their 
quarters on the approach of the insurgents, and 
received them with a discharge of blank cartridges 
— the favourite missiles of the man sitting on the 
fence. Once he could get possession of the Queen, 
Concha saw that this and other regiments would de- 
clare for him. The sentries at the gates of the palace 
offered no resistance, and a moment later the court- 
yard of the immense and grandiose edifice was 
filled with his men, eager and hopeful. The Queen 
and her sister were taking a music lesson. The 
clamour without interrupted them — no doubt to 
their momentary relief. Don Domingo Dulce, the 
veteran commander of the Halberdiers on duty 
within the palace, suspected something was amiss, 
and ordered the doors of the royal apartments to 
be closed fast. He had only time to post his little 
band at the head of the great marble staircase, when 
it was mounted by Boria, followed by a company of 
Chasseurs. " What means this outrage ? " sternly 
demanded the colonel. " I've come to do my 
duty," answered the lieutenant ; " stand aside." 
Dulce in vain implored him to retire, for his 
own sake and his men's. Seeing the guard would 
not give way, Boria ordered his men to fire. 
The Halberdiers from their commanding position 



232 A Queen at Bay 

at the head of the stairs replied, and were able to 
hold the intruders at bay. Hearing the rattle of 
musketry at their own door, the royal children went 
into paroxysms of terror. They clung to the 
Condesa Mina, their aya or governess, imploring 
her to save them, and shrieked aloud as the bullets 
came crashing and splintering through the door. 
'' Tell them we will go anywhere with them, if 
they will only spare our lives ! " screamed the child 
Queen. The widow of the redoubtable Mina was 
a woman of courage. She tried to reassure the 
children, and led them into an interior apartment. 
Crash-crack-crash ! went the musketry ; never was 
such a scene witnessed in the palace of the King. 
Concha, who had been disposing the rest of his 
men in the courtyard, rushed in, and shouted to 
Boria to cease firing. " For God's sake, Manolito, 
remember we are in her Majesty's palace ! " An 
odd scruple in the midst of such an enterprise ! 
In rushed Diego Leon, in full general's uniform, 
alarmed lest Concha should gain all the glory of 
the conspiracy. He begged the Halberdiers to 
stand aside and let the deliverers of the Queen pass. 
The defenders replied with a volley. The generals 
were warned that the government had taken alarm, 
and the militia were marching on the palace. The 
game was up, and it was time to flee. It was three 
in the morning. The little band of insurgents tried 
to gain the open country by the garden between the 
palace and the Manzanares. They were attacked 



Cristina in Exile 233 

and dispersed by a detachment of cavalry. Concha 
hid himself among the trees, and got away. Leon 
was captured, tried by court-martial, and sentenced 
to death. His wife threw herself in the path of 
the girl Queen, and prevailed on her to write to 
Espartero, commanding him to spare the young 
general's! life. The Regent ignored the command, 
and remained deaf to the entreaties of his own 
Duchess and of nearly all his old companions in 
arms. Leon drove to the place of execution in 
full uniform, his breast covered with decorations, 
seated beside General Roncali. He made a fine 
figure as he stood there — only thirty-one years 
old, handsome, glittering with all the insignia of 
military rank. Placing his hand on his heart, he 
faced the platoon, unmoved as when he had faced 
the Carlist hosts. '* Make ready ! take aim ! fire ! " 
he gave the short sharp words of command himself, 
and fell dead of the first wound he had received 
after so many campaigns. 

Three days after the attempted abduction of her 
daughter, Cristina sat in her palace at Paris, anxiously 
waiting for news. It was Isabel's birthday, and 
all the Moderates in the city had come to pay their 
respects and to hear the latest intelligence from Spain. 
To the astonishment of every one, in the midst of 
the throng appeared Salustiano Olozaga, an ardent 
radical statesman, now Spanish ambassador to the 
court of France. He elbowed his way, smiling, 
through his personal and political foes, and was 



234 A Queen at Bay 

admitted to the presence of the Queen- Mother. 
She received him with surprise, but with her usual 
good nature, addressing him as thou^ as she always 
did her daughter's subjects. 

" Good morning," began Don Salustiano. " I 
bring you six letters. Two of them are stuck 
together, but I prefer to hand them to you as they 
are." 

" You might have separated them," remarked the 
Queen, wondering. 

" I did not, out of respect for the royal seal by 
which, precisely, they are united." 

The letters were from Isabel. " Well, I began 
to be anxious for news," said Cristina. 

'' I don't wonder at such a moment," commented 
the ambassador, keeping his eyes fixed upon her. 

'' What then has happened ? " asked her Majesty. 

Olozaga affected surprise. " I am astonished that 
your Majesty should inquire. You ought to be 
better informed than I, seeing that O'Donnell has 
entitled himself your Majesty's viceroy in Navarra, 
and that Montes de Oca claims to be a member 
of your own provisional government." 

It was the Queen's turn to simulate surprise. 
" They claim to act in my name ? " 

*' Explicitly." 

" Let them produce their proofs." 

''They talk as if they had them." 

" And how could I authorize them } " 

" Not by a decree, but there are other ways." 



Cristina in Exile 235 

** Well," said the Queen, " I can only say that 
I am surprised at what you tell me." 

" In short, your Majesty does not wish to kindle 
a civil war in Spain ? " asked Olozaga tentatively. 

" It would be a calumny to suggest it," replied 
Cristina with hauteur. 

The ambassador inwardly rejoiced. " I have 
your Majesty's authority for saying so.?" he 
inquired. 

" Certainly," said the Queen-Mother ; and the 
envoy withdrew, well pleased with the result of his 
reconnaissance into the heart of the enemy's camp. 

He at once gave publicity to the Queen's dis- 
avowal. Montes de Oca, thus repudiated, found it 
impossible to satisfy the wary Basques as to the 
maintenance of their fueros. His force dwindled 
away, and the rest submitted on the approach of 
Espartero. The ringleader was taken and shot. 
On the news of the collapse of the attempt at 
Madrid, O'Donnell evacuated the citadel of Pam- 
plona, and by running away to France, lived to fight 
on many another day. The Cristino rising of 184 1 
had failed. 

To prevent its recurrence, Olozaga wished to 
alienate Cristina from her adherents, or failing this, 
to hold her up before all Europe as the author 
of the recent outrages. On being apprised of the 
attempt to kidnap Isabel II., he wrote to the Queen- 
Mother saying that, with her permission, he had 
given the utmost publicity to her disavowal of the 



236 A Queen at Bay 

men claiming to act in her name ; and that in view 
of this last outrage upon the person and dignity 
of her august daughter, he presumed she would be 
eager to publish a still more emphatic denial of 
her complicity, which he would be glad to transmit 
to the Spanish nation. 

Cristina had already awakened to the unwisdom 
and meanness of her verbal repudiation of the men 
who were laying down their lives for her. Farther 
she would not go. Her reply, addressed simply 
to Don Salustiano Olozaga, and signed by her 
private secretary, was brief : "I am commanded 
by Queen Maria Cristina de Borbon to state that 
she does not think proper to reply to your singular 
communication of the 12th instant, in which you 
misrepresent facts and falsify the words of her 
Majesty." 

The ambassador replied that he was prepared 
to overlook the insult conveyed in her Majesty's 
letter, but, on behalf of his government, he desired 
to know whether he had been right in saying that 
Queen Cristina disavowed the promoters of the 
late revolt and their proceedings. Her Majesty's 
rejoinder took the form of a very long letter, dated 
the 24th October, 1841, and again signed by her 
secretary. She persisted in her denial that she was 
the instigator of the recent insurrection ; its origin, 
she maintained, was to be found in the revolutionary 
nature of the existing government, in its usurpation 
of the royal authority, its deprivation of a mother 



Cristina in Exile 237 

of the care of her children, its attacks upon religion, 
its insults to the Holy Father, and its violation of 
the pact made at Vergara with the noble Basques 
and Navarrese ; of such a government her Majesty 
declined to make herself the accomplice by con- 
demning those who in their resistance to tyranny 
invoked her name, and who sought to rescue her 
august children from their painful captivity. 

Olozaga, in acknowledging this letter, said that 
he saw in it, first, a renewal of the Queen's original 
disavowal ; secondly, another and strongly worded 
manifesto against the government of Spain. In 
consequence, he took the bold step of requesting 
the French government to expel Maria Cristina from 
their territory, as one who was openly fomenting 
war against a friendly power. The answer was what 
he probably expected. The King of the French, he 
was told, understood his duties to friendly powers, 
but he had other duties to consider : Queen 
Cristina had sought refuge in France, at the court 
of her uncle, the best friend of her royal daughter ; 
the hospitality then extended to her would not be 
withdrawn. 

This curt reply left the Spanish ambassador 
speechless. His government was not prepared to 
fight France. The Cristino rising had been followed 
by a much more serious republican outbreak in 
Barcelona, which threatened for a time to bring 
Espartero to the ground. Seeing that Olozaga had 
taken his defeat quietly, Louis Philippe sent Salvandy 



238 A Queen at Bay 

to Madrid. Here another difficulty arose. The 
French government in 1833, unlike our cabinet, 
had made the mistake of accrediting its repre- 
sentative to the Regent instead of to the Queen. 
M. de Salvandy sought to set aside this precedent, 
and to present his credentials to Isabel in person, 
in the presence, if necessary, of Espartero. The 
Spanish government stood firm ; so did the envoy ; 
and in the end, he returned to Paris, the relations 
of the two powers having been strained almost to 
breaking-point. In England, this rebuff to Louis 
Philippe made Espartero more popular than ever. 
We were supposed to be in alliance with France, 
but it suited certain London journals to paint the 
Citizen King and his minister as the arch-enemies 
of mankind and of England in particular, and every 
slap in the face they received was accepted as a pat 
on the back for us. 



CHAPTER XIII 

THE DOWNFALL OF ESPARTERO 

CRISTINA, perceiving that the government of the 
detested Espartero was not going to fall after 
the manner of the walls of Jericho, settled down for 
a prolonged stay in Paris. She purchased Malmaison, 
the Empress Josephine's old home, for 500,000 
francs, and made it her principal residence, still main- 
taining the establishment in the Rue de Courcelles. 
This was the centre of a secret society formed by 
Martinez de la Rosa and Toreno to promote her 
interests. Its direction was entrusted to Munoz, 
who for all his alleged want of ambition, seems, 
according to the correspondence he kept up with 
Don Fernando de Cordova, to have watched very 
carefully over his wife's political interests. Cordova 
tells us that the Queen's supporters in Paris were 
sharply divided into the civil and military sets, the 
most distinguished members of the latter being 
Narvaez, Llauder, Cleonard, and Pavia. O'Donnell 
took up his abode at Orleans, and Concha at 
Florence, on account of his intense antipathy to 
Munoz. The Queen's secretary was Donoso Cortes, 

239 



240 A Queen at Bay 

one of the most eminent orators and political 
writers Spain has produced. 

In two years' time, unless Espartero carried out 
the treasonable designs of which his enemies accused 
him^ Isabel would assume the headship of the 
government, and would, it could hardly be doubted, 
at once recall her mother. The Infanta Luisa 
Carlota determined to make the most of the time 
at her disposal. Her dutiful husband wrote to 
Espartero, announcing that he was about to return 
to Spain with his family, and was ready to draw the 
sword for the existing government. Louis Philippe, 
at the instance of Cristina, exerted himself in vain to 
dissuade the princely couple from their project. He 
ordered his officials to throw every obstacle in their 
way ; but all resistance proved futile before the 
tempestuous rage and vehemence that had torn the 
crown from the head of Don Carlos. '' If you 
will not let the carriages proceed, we will walk into 
Spain on foot," screamed the Infanta to the French 
custom-house authorities. The terrified officials 
could only yield. Luisa Carlota triumphantly swept 
across the Bidassoa, continuing her journey to 
Santander. Her husband crossed the frontier at 
016ron, and travelling by Zaragoza, joined his wife 
at Burgos. Arrived at Madrid, they were refused 
accommodation in the palace by Espartero, who re- 
luctantly permitted them to see the Queen and her 
sister once a week. 

Cristina knew very well that her sister's design 



The Downfall of Espartero 241 

was to secure the hand of Isabel II. for one of her 
sons — a scheme as obnoxious to Espartero as to her. 
Concealed in a fashion journal sent her by her 
mother, the girl Queen found a letter warning 
her against " that maleficent genius, Carlota," who 
had had a hand in every intrigue against her throne. 
" Beware of that woman," the letter ran ; *' she sows 
everywhere ruin and misfortune ! Her words are 
lies, her presence is a peril. Take care that she 
does not gain an entrance to your heart." 

Carlota tried very hard to do so. She dogged 
her royal niece's footsteps, and pounced upon 
her in her walks. The Condesa Mina complained 
to Arguelles, who wrote a strong letter of re- 
monstrance to the Infanta. The person who had 
the courage to deliver this was literally kicked out 
of her presence by her Royal Highness. She found 
means, thereafter, of communicating with her niece 
by means of the Marquesa de Belgida, who, however, 
resenting the watchfulness of Arguelles, presently 
resigned her duties. A few days later, her Majesty 
was found to be in possession of a glorified likeness 
of her cousin, Don Francisco de Asis, in hussar's 
uniform. The portrait was promptly confiscated, 
and Don Jose Ventosa, one of the Queen's tutors, 
having introduced it into the palace, was there 
and then dismissed. This time, Espartero put his 
foot down very firmly ; and her Royal Highness, 
attended by her consort and family, deemed it 
prudent to take up her abode at Zaragoza. 

16 



242 A Queen at Bay 

A queen regnant is hardly out of her swaddling 
clothes before her marriage is discussed. No doubt 
the hope of seeing her son King Consort of Spain 
had prompted Luisa Carlota in her defence of her 
niece's claims ten years before. Espartero is said to 
have dreamt of an alliance that would unite Spain 
and Portugal ultimately under one head. Even the 
melancholy and hitherto irreconcilable Don Carlos 
began to look with favour on the oft-discussed 
scheme of a marriage between his son and the 
actual Queen of Spain. In a letter published in 
The Times^ Cristina is represented as writing to the 
Pretender, '* I agree to the alliance you propose 
between my august daughter, the lawful Queen of 
Spain, and your son, his Highness the Prince of 
Asturias," adding, " I do not wish to deprive Spain 
of a constitution, but I think the one actually in 
force stands in need of revision." 

This project, as when it was mooted before, 
excited the violent opposition of the old Apostolic 
section of the Carlist faction. One of these fanatics, 
Father Antonio Casares, waxed so very intemperate 
in his utterances anent the matter that his master 
disavowed him (a way Princes have !) and left him 
to cool his fevered brain in a French prison. To 
others besides the poor friar the scheme was ob- 
jectionable. Queen Victoria wrote under date 13th 
August, 1843, ^o Lord Aberdeen, expressing her 
great regret that Prince Metternich had revived 
his favourite scheme of a marriage between the 



The Downfall of Espartero 243 

Queen of Spain and a son of Don Carlos, and that 
King Louis Philippe had almost come to a secret 
understanding with him upon that point. The 
English prime minister saw more deeply than his 
royal mistress into the mind of the wily King of 
the French. He replied to her Majesty pointing 
out that the interests of this country and of all 
Europe were deeply concerned in the exclusion of 
a French Prince from the possibility of receiving 
the hand of the Queen of Spain ; and that it would 
be unwise to oppose any marriage by which this 
would be effected, consistently with the free choice 
of the Queen, and the sanction of the Spanish 
government and people. " The avowed predilec- 
tions of Queen Cristina [the despatch concludes], 
and her increased means of influence recently 
acquired, render this a matter of considerable 
importance and anxiety at the present moment." 

Both Cristina and Louis Philippe had, in fact, 
long ago come to an understanding. If Isabel 
would not be allowed by the other powers to marry 
one of the King's sons, then the alliance between 
the two branches of the Bourbon family must be 
brought about in some other way. The realization 
of the plan was not likely to be long delayed ; for 
the increased means of influence which Lord 
Aberdeen observed Queen Cristina had acquired 
was nothing less than the downfall of Espartero's 
government and his flight from Spain in the 
summer of 1843. The Regent had quarrelled 



244 A Queen at Bay 

with many of his old supporters, and had rendered 
himself as odious to the Liberals as to the Moderates. 
His bombardment of Barcelona had not been for- 
given by the people of the province, and it was 
a young Catalan colonel, afterwards famous as 
Marshal Prim, who now took steps to effect his 
downfall. " In the month of February or March, 
1 843," says Don Fernando de Cordova, " Colonel 
Don Juan Prim appeared in Paris. This officer, 
who was then hardly twenty-nine years old, had 
already acquired a reputation in the Carlist war, in 
which he had obtained, while serving in a Catalan 
irregular corps, the rank of colonel in the army. 
Distinguished by very advanced progressive ideas, 
he had been returned as deputy for the province of 
Tarragona to the Cortes of 1841 ; his cold but 
energetic character, coupled with an enterprising 
spirit, soon won for him a political position of 
importance. 

" He came to Paris to fulfil a great mission. He 
aimed at nothing less than establishing an alliance 
between the military exiles party and the progressive 
opposition in the Cortes. His first steps were 
attended with success. Having been presented at 
the palace in the Rue de Courcelles, he had several 
interviews with the Queen, and a great many with 
Don Fernando Munoz, which were the foundation 
of the intimate and cordial friendship which united 
these gentlemen and which was never broken off 
despite the vicissitudes that followed." Munoz 



The Downfall of Espartero 245 

referred his new friend to Narvaez, with whom the 
details of the coalition were settled. It is clear that 
both factions bound themselves to work together 
for the overthrow of the common foe and the 
declaration of the majority of Queen Isabel ; after 
which they should be free to pursue their separate 
ends. After more conferences with Munoz, whose 
share in these political movements was larger than 
seems to be generally supposed, the young Catalan 
officer set off for Spain. On the 30th May he 
appealed to the troops under his command and 
the people of the town of Reus, to rise in defence 
of the Queen against the dictator Espartero. The 
revolt spread with amazing rapidity. Barcelona, 
Valencia, Sevilla, Granada, Cadiz, Burgos, and La 
Coruna all pronounced against the government. 
Narvaez appeared at Barcelona, raised an army, and 
marched on Madrid. The Regent's nerve seems 
to have forsaken him. He lingered at Albacete, 
undecided in which direction to march. General 
Seoane hurried out of Madrid to meet the enemy. 
According to one version, Espartero's general had 
been bought over to the side of Cristina ; according 
to another, his troops were deliberately misled and 
thrown into confusion by their opponents* re-echoing 
their shouts of '' Viva Isabel segunda ! Viva la 
constitucion ! " That night, Narvaez entered 
Madrid in triumph. Espartero retreated to 
Andalucia, while his troops rapidly fell away from 
him. With only four hundred horse he made for 



246 A Queen at Bay 

Puerto Santa Maria, hotly pursued by General 
Concha, who reached the shore just in time to see 
the ex-Regent pulling out in a boat towards the 
British frigate Malabar. 

In London the fugitive General was made much 
of, in gratitude for his devotion to our policy. He 
was feasted by the Lord Mayor and Corporation, 
whose hospitality appears to be extended indiffer- 
ently to the friends and the enemies of freedom, 
to Czars and revolutionaries, to the Shah of Persia 
and to Giuseppe Garibaldi. 

Meanwhile, the Moderates flocked back into 
Spain to divide the spoils with the Progressives. 
A new ministry was formed, which included 
Narvaez, Prim, and the late prime minister, Lopez. 
Isabel was informed that it was the national will 
that she should be declared of age and assume the 
functions of government ; a proposal to which, of 
course, the twelve- years-old girl returned a delighted 
assent. On the 8th November, 1843, ^^ was sworn 
in as Queen of Spain with all possible ceremony, 
amid the rejoicing of the whole nation. This 
solemn submission of a great people to the control 
of a mere child was a curious spectacle, and was 
witnessed by Washington Irving, then United 
States Minister to Spain. He passed up the vast 
and magnificent staircase, thronged by '' hosts of 
old aristocratic courtiers," and paused at the doors 
of the royal apartments " still riddled like a sieve ** 
by Boria's musket-balls. In the Hall of the Am- 



The Downfall of Espartero 247 

bassadors was a dense and brilliant crowd, among 
whom the minister particularly remarked Narvaez 
and O'Donnell. 

'' For a while all was buzz and hum, like a 
beehive at swarming time, when suddenly a voice 
from the lower end of the saloon proclaimed * La 
Reina ! la reina ! ' In an instant all was hushed. 
A lane was opened through the crowd, and the 
little Queen advanced, led by the venerable General 
Castanos, Duke of Bailen, who had succeeded 
Arguelles as tutor and governor. Her train was 
borne by the Marchioness of Valverde, a splendid- 
looking woman, one of the highest nobility : next 
followed her little sister, her train borne by the 
Duchess of Medinaceli ; several other ladies of the 
highest rank were in attendance. The Queen was 
handed up to the throne by the Duke of Bailen, 
who took his stand beside her ; the Marchioness 
of Valverde arranged the royal train over the back 
of the throne, so that it spread behind the little 
Queen like the tail of a peacock. 

"The little Queen looked well. She is quite 
plump, and . . . acquitted herself with wonderful 
self-possession. Her manner was dignified and 
graceful. Her little sister, however, is far her 
superior in looks and carriage. 

** When the Queen had taken her seat, the 
cabinet ministers took their stand before the throne, 
and one of them read an address to her, stating 
the circumstances that made it expedient she should 



248 A Queen at Bay 

be declared of age. As the little Queen held her 
reply, ready cut and dried, in her hand, she paid 
but little attention to the speech, but kept glancing 
here and there about the hall, and now and then 
towards her sister, when a faint smile would appear, 
but instantly repressed. The speech ended, she 
opened the paper in her hand, and read the brief 
reply which had been prepared for her. A shout 
then burst forth from the assemblage of Viva la 
reina ! The venerable Duke of Bailen then bent 
on one knee, and kissed her hand. The Infante 
Don Francisco and his son gave the same token 
of allegiance. The same was done by every person 
present, excepting the diplomatic corps. Some 
kissed the hand of Don Francisco, but these were 
his partisans. This ceremonial took up some time. 
I observed that the Queen and her sister discriminated 
greatly as to the crowd of persons who paid this 
homage, distinguishing with smiles and sometimes 
with pleasant words those with whom they were 
acquainted. It was curious to see generals kneeling 
and kissing the hand of the sovereign, who but 
three weeks since were in rebellion against her 
government, besieging her capital, and menacing 
the royal abode. . . ." 

At the conclusion of the ceremony, the Queen 
and her sister stationed themselves on a balcony 
under a rich silk awning, while at the windows of 
the palace were seen the courtiers and functionaries 
in their most brilliant dresses. In the calm twilight 



The Downfall of Espartcro 249 

of an autumn evening in Spain, the army that had 
delivered her youthful Majesty from the tiresome 
Espartero, passed in review before her, Narvaez 
with drawn sword marching, an heroic figure, at 
their head. And so amidst plaudits and rejoicings 
Isabel 11. began the reign that was to end in flight 
and exile. 

One figure was conspicuous by her absence from 
the scene which but for her resolution and — let it 
be admitted — -finesse had never taken place. The 
Queen's mother still awaited beyond the frontiers 
of Spain the summons for her recall. Poor little 
Isabel soon learned to want her protection. Spain 
was in an uproar, cannon were thundering (as usual) 
over Barcelona, the Liberals clamoured to be ad- 
mitted to a share in the spoils. A coalition ministry 
was in office, at the head of which was Salustiano 
Olozaga, who, though he had to deal with a 
Moderate majority in the Cortes, strove to steer 
the ship of state towards a Liberal port. At last he 
made up his mind to dissolve the parliament. On 
the 29th November, Madrid was startled by a report 
that the prime minister had used violence towards 
the Queen, and had been dismissed. The amazing 
story was contained in a notarial deposition signed 
and sworn to by her Majesty. She stated that 
Olozaga unexpectedly laid before her a decree for the 
dissolution of parliament, which she refused to sign. 
In the face of his insistence, she thought fit to with- 
draw, whereupon he sprang to the door before her, 



250 A Queen at Bay 

locked it, and seizing her by her dress, forced her 
back to the table. Then, guiding her hand, he made 
her dash off the signature " Yo la Reina." When 
this statement was read in the Cortes, Olozaga was 
unable to contradict it in its essentials, but en- 
deavoured to represent the facts stated in another 
light. Washington Irving, who was no friend of 
his, thought he saw in this conduct merely the 
familiarity of ''a tutor enforcing a necessary task 
upon his pupil, and the Queen acquiesced as a 
matter of course, without probably feeling outraged 
by his dictatorial conduct." Afterwards (suggests 
the American) she sought to throw the blame of 
the decree on the minister, and told her friends 
that he made her sign it. Then it was explained 
to her that she had been subjected to a sacrilegious 
outrage, and that she must at once tell the whole 
story to Narvaez — which she did probably with the 
embellishments stories generally receive with every 
repetition. How much of the story is true, we 
agree with Major Martin Hume, it is impossible 
now to say ; true or false, Olozaga had to leave 
the country, and a successor was found for him 
in the yellow-journalist i Gonzalez Bravo, now an 
ardent Conservative. 

This person had been the author of the most 
scurrilous attacks upon Cristina in a sheet called 
the Guirigay, and had noised abroad the story 
of her *' relations " with Mufioz. The beggar on 
horseback now wished to strengthen his position 



The Downfall of Espartcro 251 

at court, and he .was actually among the first to 
propose the recall of the Queen-Mother and the 
ennoblement of her husband. This measure, in- 
evitable sooner or later, was facilitated by the 
opportune death of the Infanta Luisa Carlota. 
Washington Irving announcing the event in a letter 
dated 9th February, 1844, says that the Princess 
" had embroiled herself with all parties, and im- 
poverished her husband and herself in the prosecu- 
tion of her plans. Their failure mortified her pride 
and exasperated her temper, and of late she had 
been extremely ungracious in looks and manners. 
Her illness was preceded by a kind of fever of 
the mind. ^ I do not know what is the matter 
with me,' said she to one of her attendants ; ' wher- 
ever I am, and wherever I go, I am in a constant 
state of irritation ; at the theatre, on the Prado, at 
home, it is still the same — I am in a passion — -je 
rn enrage' In this state of mind she was attacked 
by measles and pulmonia (a kind of inflammation 
of the lungs), which, acting upon an extremely full 
plethoric habit, hurried her out of existence in the 
course of two or three days, and in the thirty-ninth 
year of her age. The body lay in state for three 
days, and the populace were admitted to see it. The 
corpse was on a bed of state, and arrayed in a 
gala dress — white brocade and gold, with a royal 
coronet — the face livid and bloated with disease." 

Luisa Carlota was calm at last ; but the webs 
spun by her busy brain had already entangled two 



252 A Queen at Bay 

young lives and threatened to spread over three 
nations. 

Within a month of her sister's death. Queen 
Cristina was on her way to Madrid. She might 
have come sooner, but that she was expecting the 
birth of her third or fourth child by her second 
husband. She came, ostensibly, in compliance with 
an invitation from the cabinet, backed by the prayer 
of the grandees of Spain and numerous powerful 
corporations. " She returns," writes Washington 
Irving, '' by the very way by which she left the 
kingdom in 1840, when the whole world seemed 
to be roused against her, and she was followed by 
clamour and execrations. What is the case at 
present ? The cities that were then almost in arms 
against her, now receive her with fetes and re- 
joicings. Arches of triumph are erected in the 
streets ; Te Deums are chanted in the cathedrals ; 
processions issue forth to escort her ; the streets 
ring with shouts and acclamations ; homage and 
adulation meet her at every step ; the meanest village 
has its ceremonial of respect, and a speech of loyalty 
from its alcalde. Thus her progress through the 
kingdom is a continual triumph." 

The American minister drove over to Aranjuez 
on the 2 1 St March, to see her arrive. '' The scene 
of the rendezvous was quite picturesque," he tells 
his correspondent. " On an open plain, a short 
distance from the road, was pitched the royal tent 
— very spacious and decorated with fluttering flags 



The Downfall of Espartero 253 

and streamers. Three or four other tents were 
pitched in the vicinity, and there was an immense 
assemblage of carriages, with squadrons of cavalry, 
and crowds of people of all ranks, from the grandee 
to the beggar. The impatience of the little Queen 
and her sister would not permit them to remain 
in the tent ; they were continually sallying forth 
among the courtiers, to a position that commanded 
a distant view of the road from Ocana. Poor 
things ! they were kept nearly a couple of hours 
in anxious suspense. At length the royal cortege 
was seen descending the distant slope of the road, 
escorted by squadrons of lancers, whose yellow 
uniforms, with the red flag of the lance fluttering 
aloft, made them look at a distance like a moving 
mass of fire and flame. As they drew near the 
squadrons of horse wheeled off into the plain, and 
the royal carriage approached. The impatience of 
the little Queen could no longer be restrained. 
Without waiting at the entrance of the tent to 
receive her royal mother, she hurried forth through 
the avenue of guards, quite to the road, where I 
lost sight of her. . . . The reception of the Queen- 
Mother was quite enthusiastic. The air resounded 
with acclamations. The old nobility, who have long 
been cast down and dispirited, look upon the return 
of the Queen- Mother as the triumph of their cause 
and the harbinger of happier and more prosperous 
days." 

Yes, Cristina had returned, having in the long 



254 A Queen at Bay 

run triumphed over Espartero and the Liberals as 
she had triumphed over Carlos and the Conservatives. 
A good-natured woman of the world, she bore no 
malice and was content to forget past humiliation in 
the triumph of the present. At once she began to 
talk of an amnesty for recent political offenders, and 
of moderating the severity with which the Queen's 
generals were subduing the rebellion in various 
parts of the country. As she was entering Madrid, 
seated on the left of her daughter, a courtier 
rode up to the carriage, and gleefully announced 
the death, that same day, of her old opponent 
Arguelles, the Queen's late tutor. *' Hush," said 
Cristina, "do not let the children hear you, for 
they loved the old man." 



CHAPTER XIV 

THE SPANISH MARRIAGES 

CRISTINA, while she showed no disposition 
to pursue her enemies, determined that her 
friends should participate in her recovered good 
fortune. She did not forget those who were dead. 
The body of her old partisan, Montes de Oca, 
who had been shot by Espartero, was exhumed, 
transported to Madrid, and reinterred with the most 
solemn funeral honours. Now, too, Cristina was 
at last able to ennoble her much-loved spouse. 
Munoz was created a grandee of Spain of the first 
class, under the title of Duke of Riansares (that 
being the name of the river on which his native 
town stands) ; and in the official gazette appeared 
the royal decree authorizing the marriage contracted 
eleven years before. It ran thus : " Having regard 
to the grave considerations submitted to me by my 
august mother, Dona Maria Cristina de Borbon, 
and having taken counsel with my ministers, I 
have authorized her to contract a marriage with 
Don Fernando Munoz, Duque de Riansares ; and 
I further declare that in so contracting an alliance 
with a person of lower station, she has in no way 

255 



256 A Queen at Bay 

forfeited my favour and affection ; she shall suffer 
no prejudice in her style and title, or in any of the 
honours, prerogatives, and distinctions belonging 
to her ; and the issue of this marriage shall be 
subject to the I2th article of the 9th law, title 11, 
book 10, of the Nueva Recopilacion^ being able 
to inherit the property of their parents, in the 
manner the law directs. I, the Queen." 

In conformity with this decree, Cristina and 
Munoz were married a second time on the 
1 2th October, 1844, by the Cardinal Archbishop of 
Toledo. As the Catholic Church forbids the repeti- 
tion of the sacrament of marriage between the same 
persons, we may well be puzzled as to the nature 
of the first ceremony, which seems to have been 
legalized by the Pope during Cristina's stay at 
Rome. In all Christian countries except England, 
however, there seems to have flourished the belief 
that marriage consisted in the solemn taking of 
each other before witnesses for man and wife — the 
superstition that it consisted in a precise legal or 
religious formula being confined to us. Certain 
Catholic theologians certainly continued to make a 
distinction between marriage and the sacrament of 
marriage, till Pius IX. in 1852 declared that outside 
the sacrament there could be no marriage between 
Catholics. But in 1833, Cristina and Munoz were 
probably well and truly married in the opinion of 
all Christians outside England. The point is of 
interest, but hardly important. 




From a lithograph by S. Gonzales 
AGUSTIN FERNANDO MUNOZ 

DIKE OF RIAXSARES 



p. 256] 



The Spanish Marriages 257 

Gonzalez Bravo* took some credit to himself for 
this satisfactory adjustment of the Queen-Mother's 
affairs, and he was certainly on the high road to 
her favour, when some unknown enemy of his 
sent her Majesty a richly chased casket, which was 
found to contain the copy of El Guirigay denouncing 
in the most scurrilous terms the connection of 
Cristina and the ex-guardsman. The revelation cost 
the journalist minister his post. He was sent to 
the embassy at Lisbon, and a cabinet was formed 
under the presidency of Narvaez. 

Now began the regime not untruly termed the 
second regency of Cristina. Her Majesty was 
now a stout matron, nearing forty ; a much less 
beautiful but far shrewder woman than the wife of 
Fernando VII. In her exile she appears to have 
found spiritual regeneration, for she was as con- 
spicuous now for her piety as formerly for the lack 
of it. Solicitude for one's welfare in the next world 
is not unfrequently accompanied by the liveliest 
concern for one's interests in this ; and the Queen- 
Mother's devotion to relics and religious exercises 
was equalled if not surpassed by her zeal for money- 
getting and speculation. If she went on her travels 
again, she had clearly determined that it should 
be with a purse well lined and with friends all 
comfortably provided for. The treatment she had 
received from the Spanish people had not been such 
as to endear them to her, or to quicken whatever 
sense of responsibility as a ruler she may ever have 

17 



258 A Queen at Bay 

possessed. Moreovef, all her affection seems to 
have been reserved for the children of her second 
marriage, her love-match. To strengthen her 
position and theirs, she was not disposed to consider 
too closely the sentiments of poor ugly little Isabel 
or of the nation. The little Queen had a large 
measure of her mother's passionate nature, and much 
of her father's cynical, indelicate humour ; but bold, 
bluff, and knowing as she was, she was but a puppet 
in the hands of her clever mother and her step- 
father, the unassuming, unambitious, and intensely 
self-seeking Duke of Riansares. 

The dynasty must be strengthened by a family 
alliance with a first-class power, whose arms would 
protect it against domestic and foreign foes. This 
was the primary consideration that Cristina saw in 
regard to her daughter's marriage. From first to 
last, throughout the tangled negotiations that nearly 
set Europe ablaze, she never seems to have given 
Isabel's personal inclinations a moment's attention. 
She had never been consulted as to her own marriage 
with the elderly, worn-out King of Spain ; as a 
Neapolitan and a Princess, she expected to be dis- 
posed of absolutely as her parents willed. On the 
whole, she would probably have argued, her parents 
had done very well for her, and she could have 
found no reason (had she looked for one) for pur- 
suing a different policy as regarded her daughter. 
Incapable of deliberate cruelty, Cristina sacrificed 
everybody and everything to her own aims, with 



The Spanish Marriages 259 

the cheery conviction that the others would not 
mind much, and that if they did, it would all come 
right in the end. 

The ideal scheme was to marry Isabel to Louis 
Philippe's fourth son, Henri, Due d'Aumale ; but 
the old King shook his head. The other powers, 
least of all England, would not tolerate this revival 
of the schemes of Louis XIV. ; there were still, 
alas ! the Pyrenees. On the other hand, France, 
in diplomatic phrase, could not regard with indiffer- 
ence the establishment of a foreign dynasty in the 
adjoining kingdom. The matrimonial alliances of 
sovereigns in those days had a powerful influence 
in the affairs of nations. Portugal, for instance, 
whose Queen was married to the cousin of our 
Prince Albert, was completely under the thumb of 
England ; and this instance was the more ominous 
since it was rumoured that another Coburg Prince 
considered himself a candidate for Queen Isabel's 
hand. The scheme must be nipped in the bud. 
Before long there would be a Coburg on every 
throne in Europe. Louis Philippe saw a way of re- 
lieving the apprehensions of both France and England. 
The French ambassador in London proposed to 
Lord Aberdeen that her Catholic Majesty's choice of 
a husband should be limited to her own House of 
Bourbon, the French branch, however, being barred. 
The English prime minister demurred. He could 
not see by what right the two powers could pre- 
sume to limit the young lady's choice. " Then 



26o A Queen at Bay 

you cannot object to our Due d'Aumale ? " said the 
Frenchman. There was the difficulty. However, 
in September 1843, Queen Victoria visited Louis 
Philippe at Eu, and the two prime ministers who 
accompanied them struck a bargain. The French 
proposal was accepted. Louis Philippe's son would 
decline the honour of the Queen of Spain's hand, 
on the understanding that it was to be given 
to another Bourbon Prince. England was to give 
no countenance or support to any candidate not 
belonging to the dynasty of Henri IV. " And 
remember," concluded Guizot, " the apparition of 
the Prince of Coburg will mean the resurrection of 
the Due d'Aumale." 

Cristina, of course, was no party to this compact. 
She did not share her uncle's fear of England, know- 
ing very well that once the marriage she had at heart 
had taken place, we should have had to accept the 
accomplished fact and would not have gone to war 
with two nations merely to gratify our spite. How- 
ever, she pretended to fall in with the old King's 
views, and agreed to look for a husband for her 
daughter among the Spanish and Italian Bourbons. 
There was the Conde de Montemolin, the son of 
Don Carlos ; the sons of Francisco de Paula and 
Luisa Carlota ; and her own brothers of Naples. 
Her choice fell upon one of these last, the Conte 
di Trapani, a youth still in his 'teens. Louis 
Philippe thought the match would be a good one, 
but nobody was enthusiastic about it. Metternich, 



The Spanish Marriages 261 

who wanted Isabel to marry Montemolin, opposed 
it, and even brought the Queen of Naples round 
to his view. The boy himself had entered a Jesuit 
novitiate, and had no taste for matrimony. The 
Spaniards looked on him disdainfully, as an Italian 
and a weakling. " If he is going to marry our 
Queen," quoth the brusque Narvaez, *' at least let 
him learn something of a soldier's life and shake off 
his cassock ! " 

The negotiations languished. They were followed 
with the liveliest interest by M. Bresson and Mr. 
Henry Bulwer, the representatives of France and 
England at the court of Madrid. Both these diplo- 
matists were strong-minded, high-spirited men, each 
eager and ready to outwit the other. Their disposi- 
tions prompted them to act first and to consult their 
Governments afterwards. Bulwer, who was Palmer- 
ston's man, of course stood for progress and 
liberalism, and was regarded with profound distrust 
by the party now in power in Spain. He had no 
sympathy with the Bourbon-only policy of Lord 
Aberdeen, and was inclined to think a great deal 
less of it than his lordship's previous pronouncement 
on the Queen of Spain's freedom of choice. When 
leaving Paris in November 1843, ^^ ^^^^ ^P ^^^ 
appointment at Madrid, he had been received by 
Cristina, who told him that failing the Due d' Aumale, 
she would like Coburg for a son-in-law. Unaffected 
by the agreement come to at Eu, the Spanish 
ambassador in London also said, quite openly, that 



262 A Queen at Bay 

if the French match was impossible, Spain must 
seek a matrimonial alliance with England, as the 
support of one of these great powers was essential 
to her prosperity. Whether Cristina was sincere in 
these declarations, it is unsafe to say. She had set 
her heart on a French marriage, but she may have 
seriously contemplated the other eventuality as a 
last resource. If it was merely her object to work 
on the fears of Louis Philippe, she was successful. 
Bresson warned Guizot that the Queen-Mother 
was getting out of control, and asked, if it was 
the only means of excluding Coburg, whether he 
could bring the Due d'Aumale once more into the 
lists. To this his government would not consent ; 
the Duke was, in fact, married to a Neapolitan 
Princess on the 25th November, 1 844 ; but on the 
following day Guizot wrote to the ambassador, 
telling him that if Isabel married the Conte di 
Trapani, Louis Philippe would accept the hand of 
her sister, the Infanta Luisa Fernanda, for his fifth 
son, the Due de Montpensier. 

Cristina heard this announcement with joy. " For 
the love of God, don't let this Prince escape us," 
she cried to Narvaez. The offer seems to have 
been regarded as none the less liberal because the 
Infanta had a private fortune of about six hundred 
thousand pounds — no bad price, if I may be allowed 
to say so, for the fifth son of a citizen king. 
Narvaez also approved the scheme ; but asked 
impatiently why, after all, the Prince should not 




p. 262] 



DON FRANCISCO DE ASIS 

HUSBAND OF ISABEL II. 



The Spanish Marriages 263 

marry the Queen herself. Perhaps it was to 
force France's hand that the Trapani match was 
suffered definitely to collapse. But Louis Philippe 
stood firm : the Due de Montpensier for Luisa 
Fernanda only when Isabel has married a Spanish or 
Italian Bourbon. But the only Bourbons left were 
the sons of the hated Luisa Carlota — the Dukes of 
Cadiz and Seville. The first, Don Francisco de 
Asis, was regarded with something like derision 
even by his own family, by whom he was familiarly 
known as Paquita (Fanny). Though in military 
uniform he could look smart enough, there was 
such an absence of all that is masculine about him 
that no one ever thought of him as a husband. 
His brother, Don Enrique, on the other hand, had 
inherited his mother's vivacious temper, and much 
of her force of character. He had avowed himself 
a decided Radical, and having been mixed up in 
a pronunciamiento^ had been practically exiled to 
the frigate of which he was commander. Surely 
the King of the French did not expect the Queen 
of Spain to marry either of these impossible young 
men ? His Majesty did ; he did not favour the 
Duke of Seville, but he could not see that any 
serious objection could be raised to Don Francisco. 
Because a man's friends persist in calling him by 
a girl's name, is he to be denied the advantages 
and pretensions of his state of life ? The only 
possible answer to such a query is, of course, You 
should know the man yourself! 



264 A Queen at Bay 

Bulwer, our ambassador, was fortunate enough 
to do so ; and to him at this juncture the Queen- 
Mother turned for sympathy. He was placed in 
an awkward situation, for on the occasion of Queen 
Victoria's second visit to Eu, in September 1845, 
Lord Aberdeen had again disavowed the Coburg 
candidature, in exchange for Guizot's promise that 
the Montpensier marriage should not take place till 
Isabel had been married and had borne a child. 
Yet here was Donoso Cortes, her Catholic Majesty's 
secretary, talking to the envoy about the amiable 
Prince Leopold, of the unhappy fate in store for the 
girl Queen, of the natural feelings of a mother, and 
of the tyrannical conduct of Louis Philippe. The 
new prime minister, Isturiz, presently began to hold 
forth in the same strain. " Finally," says Bulwer, 
*'came the Duke of Riansares, Queen Cristina's 
husband, who said that Spain v/as not strong enough 
to stand up alone against Louis Philippe ; but that 
if England would promise her support, the young 
Queen would not submit passively to have her 
destiny subjected to foreign dictation, and to be 
treated with supercilious indifference." 

The temptation to score off M. Bresson was too 
strong for our representative. "Pity for the young 
Princess about to be so heartlessly sacrificed," and 
the not unwarrantable behef that the German match 
would be approved at Windsor while condemned at 
Downing Street, induced Bulwer to lend a willing 
ear to the proposals of Cristina and her wily husband. 



The Spanish Marriages 265 

'' Had I been able to guide the conduct of the 
Spanish court," he admits, " I should have tied its 
tongue, and confined its endeavours to getting Prince 
Leopold to visit Madrid, when a marriage taking 
place suddenly, with the approval of the Cortes and 
amidst the acclamations of the army, would have 
been irrevocable." As far as this, considering the 
engagements entered into by his government, he 
dared not go ; but he permitted himself to say 
that he did not see how a marriage so reasonable 
and unobjectionable could be persistently opposed 
by the King of the French if the parties immediately 
interested were bent upon it. To this his Grace of 
Riansares repHed that his august consort considered 
her uncle's demands unreasonable, and was prepared 
to oppose them, if there were any chance of success ; 
as to the Due de Montpensier, if he wished, in 
consequence of the Queen's marriage, to withdraw 
his demand for the hand of the Infanta, he was quite 
free to do so. Queen Cristina's language and 
conduct were, in the opinion of Bulwer, frank and 
consistent, and did not deserve the suspicions of 
duplicity they excited in some quarters. 

In the end. Sir Henry undertook to deliver a 
letter from her Majesty to Prince Leopold, who was 
then staying at Lisbon. *' I am aware," wrote 
Cristina, " that the Queen of England is animated 
by friendship for France, and that she supports an 
alliance favourable to that country ; but I believe 
her to insist as strongly as I do myself on the 



266 A Queen at Bay 

independence of Spain in this matter, and 1 presume 
that, should my daughter*s choice fall on you, the 
match could not but be agreeable to her." To this 
letter his Highness could only reply by expressing 
his gratitude, for he dared not, being a Prince, take 
any step without the consent of the heads of his 
family — the King of the Belgians, the Prince Consort, 
and the Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. 

The unlucky Bulwer, on mentioning his share in 
this transaction to Lord Aberdeen, found that he 
had fired a mine. The minister severely repri- 
manded him, and disclosed the whole business to 
M. Guizot. The Coburg candidature collapsed, 
and Cristina had to submit to a sound rating from 
her uncle and aunt. 

Despite Lord Aberdeen's prompt repudiation of 
his agent's acts, the incident completely destroyed 
all confidence between England and France. The 
French not unnaturally believed that Bulwer was on 
the watch to trick them. Nor was the understanding 
between the three powers improved by the return 
of Lord Palmerston to the Foreign Office, for he 
was known to be the enemy of France and the 
staunch friend and protector of Espartero. Taking 
advantage of the bad impression his appointment 
made on the Spanish court, Bresson tried to woo 
Cristina back to the French side. But she was hard 
to manage, changing (or affecting to change) her mind 
from day to day, seeming sometimes on the point 
of returning to the Trapani scheme, at others, of 



The Spanish Marriages 267 

renewing negotiations with the irrepressible Coburg. 
At last Bresson determined, by taking a leaf out of 
Bulwer's book, to bring matters to a head. He 
considered that, through her ambassador's support 
of Prince Leopold, England had released France 
from her reciprocal undertaking. On the nth July, 
1846, he told Queen Cristina that the day Isabel II. 
was married to a Bourbon Prince, the Due de 
Montpensier would marry her sister, the stipulation 
that the latter marriage should not take place till 
after the first being thus disregarded. 

Cristina at once closed with the bargain. The 
Bourbon Prince must be the ridiculous Paquita, but 
this was rather an advantage than otherwise, for 
she made sure he would not have a child, and 
Louis Philippe's grandson becoming thus heir to 
the throne of Spain, France would have to stand by 
her dynasty tide what may. In short, the scheme, 
as she supposed it was going to result, meant the 
realization of her first project deferred one step. 
But if Bresson's proposal filled her with joy, it made 
old Louis Philippe frantic. Never mind about 
Bulwer's want of faith ; he would stick to his bond 
with England ; the marriages should not take place 
simultaneously. He had never broken faith with 
any one, and he was not going to let his agents do 
it in his name. But, as if to justify Bresson's 
manoeuvre, at the very moment the old King was 
speaking thus (July 19th), Lord Palmerston was 
penning a despatch to Bulwer, in which he examined 



268 A Queen at Bay 

the claims of the candidates for the Queen's hand, 
and expressed the hope that she would take Coburg, 
and her sister, Don Enrique. In plain English, we 
were backing the very candidate we had repudiated 
at Eu. In a later despatch, his Lordship went 
further, and told Bulwer that the most important 
thing was to prevent the Montpensier match. 
Having thus broken with France, the minister seems 
to have thought he had not sufficiently antagonized 
the Spanish government by proposing Don Enrique, 
and therefore rated it soundly for its wickedness and 
incapacity. We are not surprised that Isturiz asked 
Bulwer if his chief had gone mad. 

This being the attitude of England, Cristina 
hesitated no longer. Don Francisco, unknown to 
her, had written on the I2th July to the young 
Don Carlos, acknowledging his superior claim to 
the hand of their cousin. This indiscreet letter fell 
into the hands of Guizot, by whom it was burnt ; 
and upon the renewed assurance of Bresson that the 
marriages should be practically simultaneous, the silly 
young Prince was summoned to Madrid and told to 
make himself agreeable to her Majesty. He tried 
with so little success that it seemed that the whole 
project would be defeated by opposition from the 
quarter whence it was least expected — from the person 
most interested. Isabel envied her sister " her nice 
Montpensier." On the night of the 27th August 
there was a scene at the palace — another of those 
outrages on morality and humanity which the home 



The Spanish Marriages 269 

of the Kings of Spain had so often witnessed. 
A young girl was heard weeping within the royal 
apartments. Cristina tried persuasion, some say 
violence, but retired at last baffled and perhaps 
ashamed. Then the Duke of Riansares was sent 
in to her Majesty. Probably he had not entirely 
forgotten his barrack-room manners, and they may 
have come in useful now. The halberdiers who 
had fought so lustily to save their Queen from 
Concha and Leon, made no effort to rescue her 
from worse foes now. Long past midnight Isabel 
rushed into her mother's room, threw herself into 
her arms, and said '* Yes." The ministers, who 
were awaiting this result, were at once called in, 
and were informed that her Catholic Majesty had 
deigned to accept the hand of the Infante Don 
Francisco de Asis, and at the same time to bestow 
her sister in marriage on the Due de Montpensier. 
Then some one ran off, at two o'clock at night, 
to awaken Bresson and to tell him the good 
news. 

In England the announcement of the double 
espousals excited a storm of indignation. In the 
columns of The Times and other newspapers the 
most opprobrious epithets were applied to Louis 
Philippe and his minister. Queen Victoria in 
angry notes, with every second word underscored, 
told the King of the Belgians what she thought of 
her late friend and ally ; though she admitted that 
Palmerston was largely responsible for the misunder- 



270 A Queen at Bay 

standing. Bulwer called at the palace to congratulate 
her Majesty on her approaching marriage. " But 
as to the proposed alliance of her Highness the 

Infanta " he went on. '' It will take place the 

same day as her Majesty's/' said the Queen-Mother 
sweetly. Before the envoy could resume what would 
no doubt have been an expostulation, he found 
himself engaged in a conversation with his royal 
interrupter and General Narvaez on the advantage 
the latter had derived from a stay in Paris. Before 
long, official protests were presented by the English 
ambassador to the French and Spanish governments. 
Cristina cared nothing for them, and nothing for the 
unpopularity of the Montpensier match in Spain 
itself. With Narvaez at her side, to use the 
stick and hit hard (to quote his own phrase), she 
felt fully equal to the situation. The petitions 
against the marriage that were sent in from every 
town in the kingdom were deposited in the royal 
waste-paper baskets ; the angry cries of Down with 
the gahachos I heard in the lower quarters of Madrid 
were stifled by the police and the troops. Her 
Majesty's innumerable enemies at home and abroad 
began to gnash their teeth, but finally determined 
to set them and to bear it. Cristina had won the 
game ; and on the 6th September, she went off 
with her husband to his native place of Tarancon, 
to offer their thanks to the local Virgin — a present 
from Gregory the Great to King Reccared. This 
pilgrimage was made the occasion of a reception at 



The Spanish Marriages 271 

the handsome new palace the Duke of Riansares 
had built on the banks of his eponymous stream. 

Despite protests and threats, the preparations for 
the marriage went on apace. The two alliances 
were approved by the Cortes, with one dissentient 
voice — that of Senor Orense. The contracts were 
drawn up and signed ; and the Due de Montpensier, 
accompanied by his brother of Aumale, set out for 
Madrid on the 28th September. He was followed 
by a whole host of sightseers, among whom was the 
genial Alexandre Dumas. England's hostile attitude 
now rather disposed the people towards the French, 
and the Princes were well received in all the towns 
through which they passed. Their entry into the 
capital was certainly not the signal for an outburst 
of popular rejoicing ; but it was all very pleasant 
and decorous. There had been some talk of 
shooting Montpensier from a window on the line 
of the procession, but Bulwer, to whom the 
plot was communicated, insisted on its abandon- 
ment, and manifested his resentment only by 
retiring to Aranjuez during the festivities that 
followed. 

The sacrifice was consummated on Isabel's six- 
teenth birthday, the loth October, 1846. The 
ceremony, as appears to have been usual in Spain, 
was in two parts. At nine o'clock at night, in the 
throne-room of the palace, the Queen plighted her 
troth to her cousin, Don Francisco de Asis, and 
the two were then joined in matrimony by the 



272 A Queen at Bay 

Patriarch of the Indies. The Infanta Luisa Fernanda 
—a child of fourteen — was then married to the 
Due de Montpensier. Next day, the newly wedded 
couples went in great state to the church of the 
Atocha, to assist at the nuptial mass and to receive 
the Pontifical benediction — the velacion this part 
of the ceremony is called in Spain, from the veils 
placed over the brides' heads while the blessing 
is pronounced. Then the party returned to the 
palace, *' followed," says a Spanish writer, " by the 
gaze but not the acclamations of the multitude." 
" There were one or two cries of Viva el Infante 
Don Francisco^'' says an eye-witness, " and Viva la 
Reina ! But, notwithstanding the constant efforts 
of the Queen-Mother and the French Princes to 
attract attention by bowing, smiling, nodding their 
heads, no notice was taken of them ; nor were their 
salutes returned. In the passage leading to the 
church of the Atocha, some well-dressed persons 
raised their hats as the Infanta passed. The Due 
de Montpensier availed himself of the occasion to 
return the salute. It was, however, by no means 
intended for him, but only for the sister of the 
Queen. The day was fine, notwithstanding a smart 
breeze. The troops looked well ; and the hangings 
in the balconies of the fine street of Alcala had a 
gay appearance. As far as the people were con- 
cerned, there were no signs of enthusiasm, nor 
anything approaching it." Even in England at 
that time, it should be remembered, it was not 



The Spanish Marriages 273 

considered bad taste to be wanting in enthusiasm 
for foreign royalty, and monarchs esteemed tyrants 
in their own countries could by no means count 
on a welcome among us. But this was sixty years 
ago. 

Everything was done to give an air of festivity to 
the proceedings. The arena of Madrid was sodden 
with the blood of hundreds of bulls and horses. 
The Puerta del Sol outrivalled Smithfield market. 
Rockets and Bengal lights announced for miles 
around the marriage of the Queen of Spain. Cristina, 
newly established in a palace in the Calle de las 
Rejas, was radiant and benign. To her triumphs 
over Don Carlos and liberalism, she added this 
victory over English diplomacy. She had welded 
the thrones of France and Spain together by in- 
dissoluble bonds — bonds, rather, that would unite 
them so long as both stood upright. Her husband, 
too, had good cause for rejoicing. Louis Philippe 
had recognized his services by conferring on him 
the dukedom of Montmorot and the grand cordon 
of the Legion of Honour. He was a knight, 
also, of the Order of the Golden Fleece. Very 
pleased was Francisco de Asis, on whom was 
bestowed the title of Majesty and of King-Consort. 
Cristina, having had her way, wanted everybody 
to be happy. Don Enrique was coaxed back, and 
promised to behave more discreetly in the future. 
Decorations and rewards were showered on the 
French party, and Bresson's infant son was created 

18 



274 A Queen at Bay 

a grandee of Spain. Luisa Fernanda, delighted 
with her husband, set out with him for Paris on 
the 22nd October. There, it was stated, they in- 
tended permanently to reside. And the unhappiest 
girl in all Spain was its sixteen-year-old Queen. 



CHAPTER XV 

CROWNS IN PROSPECT AND IN PERIL 

CRISTINA, perceiving that the tide of success 
was at its flood, determined to launch her 
second family upon it. Her husband was a Senator, 
a Grandee of Spain, a Duke twice over, a General, 
a Knight of the Golden Fleece and of the Legion 
of Honour — for him she could not do much more 
just then. For his father, she obtained the title 
of Count of Retamoso ; for his brothers, various 
decorations and offices ; his sister, she married to 
Don Jose Fulgosio, an ex-Carlist, now Captain- 
General of New Castille. The elevation of this 
family gave offence to many of the old nobility, who 
talked the usual platitudes about upstarts, beggars 
on horseback, and so forth, regardless of the fact 
that their own ancestors had in nearly all cases 
owed their rank to the favour of some king or 
queen. If titles of nobiUty were conferred according 
to merit, the objection to the aggrandisement of 
the Munoz family could be sustained ; but to the 
ordinary intelligence it might seem that the good- 
will and liking of your sovereign is as good a 

275 



276 A Queen at Bay 

title to distinction as the services, real or imaginary, 
rendered by some ancestor dead centuries before. 
It is still more difficult to account for the contempt 
professed in some quarters for Cristina's children 
by her second husband, who were undoubtedly 
Bourbons on one side and the grandchildren of a 
King. They were now brought to Madrid, and 
introduced to their royal half-sister, who showered 
titles upon them. There was nearly an explosion 
in aristocratic circles when, at a reception given by 
Cristina, it was noticed that the chairs occupied 
by the little Condesa de Vista Alegre and the 
Marquesa del Castillejo were placed on the same 
level as that in which sat the Queen herself. 

His Grace of Riansares always posed as a retiring, 
unassuming man, devoid of ambition, but neither 
he nor his consort missed a chance of promoting 
the interests of their children. Soon after the 
Queen- Mother's return to Madrid, Spain found 
herself involved in difficulties with her one-time 
dependency of Mexico. With the aid of a party 
in that country, Narvaez, then prime minister, 
believed he saw an opportunity of converting the 
republic into a monarchy under a Spanish Prince. 
He thought the crown would fit the troublesome 
Don Enrique, whose father, it will be remembered, 
had been interested in a similar scheme twenty years 
before, but Cristina astonished him by suggesting 
one of her own little sons for the honour. The 
general said that Spain would not pour out her 



Crowns in Prospect and in Peril 277 

blood and treasure for the aggrandisement of a 
private family. " Very well," replied her Majesty, 
" then place Montemolin on the Mexican throne. 
It will be a good way of getting rid of him." In 
view of what afterwards happened to the Emperor 
Maximilian, the Queen spoke more truly than she 
knew. Narvaez considered both her suggestions 
impracticable, and, mainly owing to this disagreement, 
resigned the presidency of the council of ministers. 

Among the numerous exiled South American 
presidents and dictators inhabiting Paris at this time 
was General Flores, who had played the same part 
in Ecuador as Rosas in the Argentine. Perhaps he 
had heard some whispers of the Mexican scheme ; 
in any case, he presented himself to the Duque de 
Rivas, Spanish ambassador at Naples, and told 
him that the time had come for Soain to reassert 
her sway over her old colonies and to put an end 
to the anarchy that prevailed there. With an 
assumption of candour, the ex-President informed 
the ambassador that he had himself fought for the 
independence of his country, but that he regretted 
his error, as he saw now that the people were 
unfitted for liberty and that they were entirely 
subject to the influence of men without rank or 
principle. These views were most gratifying to 
the Duke, who passed Flores on to Madrid with 
introductions to Isturiz, the new prime minister, 
to Riansares, and to Cristina herself. 

Here then was a kingdom — a long way off, it 



278 A Queen at Bay 

is true — for Munoz's son. Flores readily agreed 
to place him on the throne of Ecuador — as soon 
as it was constructed — with the title of Juan I. 
Cristina, her husband, his brother, and the ministry 
were afterwards taxed with having been privy to 
this conspiracy against the independence of a friendly 
state ; though this was never proved, it is certain 
that Flores was allowed to equip an expedition at 
Santander and Bilbao, and that numerous officers 
and men of the regular army were licensed to take 
service under him. Public attention was engrossed 
at the time by the royal marriages ; but a dispute 
occurred between the agents of the filibusters in 
London, and this ended in the exposure of the 
project. The ministry could no longer shut its 
eyes to what was going on. The officers and 
privates who had joined Flores were recalled to 
their regiments, and his force melted away. Cristina's 
dream of a kingdom for her boy faded into thin 
air, and she was obliged to content herself with 
seeing him made Duke of Tarancon, his father's 
native place. 

Her Majesty had soon reason to regret that 
Don Enrique and Don Carlos the younger had not 
been relegated to Mexico, or to an even warmer 
and remoter region. Every effort was made to 
mollify the King-Consort's brother, and to detach 
him from his alliance with the Liberals. He was 
believed to be in correspondence with Espartero, 
and was offered the rank of admiral if he would 



Crowns in Prospect and in Peril 279 

give up the ex-Regent's letters. But the son of 
Luisa Carlota proved intractable and incorruptible. 
Cristina introduced a spy into his household in the 
person of Senora Arana, who was lady-in-waiting 
to his sisters. The Prince was not slow to conceive 
suspicions of this lady, and she soon found her 
post anything but a bed of roses. The palace of 
San Juan resounded with imprecations, recrimina- 
tions, and loud complainings. Several times the 
unfortunate woman was dismissed, but, with an in- 
trepidity that cannot be too much admired, returned 
to the post of danger and duty. One night the 
young Queen was at the theatre. " Her cousins 
the Infantas [says The Times correspondent] were 
in the habit of visiting the royal box on such 
occasions, and remaining there during the perform- 
ance. On the night in question they were unable 
to do so, because Maria Cristina, Munoz, and her 
women-in-waiting were there, as well as Senora 
Arana ; and the royal box was completely filled. 
These little manoeuvres were known to be planned 
by Maria Cristina with the object of preventing her 
daughter from enjoying the society of her cousins. 

" Don Enrique was with his sisters, and was 
observed to cast indignant glances at the place where 
the Queen was sitting, at finding that they were 
excluded from her society by such persons as the 
husband and attendants of his aunt. 

'' When the family of Don Francisco returned 
home, Don Enrique gave vent to his feelings in a 



28o A Queen at Bay 

burst of rage. When the wife of Arana returned 
next day to perform her usual duties, he informed 
her, in terms not to be misunderstood, that she 
should instantly quit the service of his sisters. She 
resisted, and, presuming on her secret favour with 
Maria Cristina, answered him in a tone of insolence. 
Don Enrique went beyond all bounds : he declared 
that if Senora Arana did not, without further delay 
or parley, quit the house of his father hy the door^ 
he should show her the way out without ceremony, 
and by a mode of exit much more rapid but not 
so convenient. This threat frightened her out of 
her wits, and she saw by the expression in the 
Prince's eyes that he was quite in earnest. 

" Regardless of bag or baggage, she ran off to 
her protectress, Maria Cristina, who accompanied 
her to the Queen ; and then Senora Arana began 
to weep most piteously at the insult oifered to her, 
and, what was still worse, at the loss of her place, 
which, I believe, is lucrative. It is not necessary 
to dwell on this scene of affliction, which even 
melted * the foolish, fat scullions ' of the royal 
kitchen. It is sufficient to say that the wife of that 
important officer, the introductor of ambassadors 
[Senora Arana], was enrolled among the waiting 
women of the Queen herself. Her row with Don 
Enrique only ended in her promotion. The Infante 
was, no doubt, smarting under the sting of his 
late humiliation, and was anxious to give vent to 
his rage on some one." 




i 



From " Romance of Royalty ' 



p. 280] 



DON ENRIQUE 



Crowns in Prospect and in Peril 281 

His Highness was sternly rebuked for his im- 
petuosity, and his resentment increasing to fever- 
heat, he joined the Freemasons — a body identified 
in Spain with anti-monarchical and anti-clerical 
doctrines. Cristina thought of finding him a wife. 
He found one for himself — Dona Elena de Castelvi, 
the charming sister of the Marques de Castella. 
'' I told you I would never marry any one but a 
Spaniard," proclaimed Enrique. Isabel II., probably 
angry that one who had lately been a suitor for 
her hand should so soon have consoled himself, 
refused to recognize the marriage, and the happy 
pair had to leave Spain. Enrique became an en- 
thusiastic republican, and was in consequence stripped 
of his dignities and titles. He returned to his 
country upon the setting up of a republic, and 
vigorously combated the proposed restoration of 
the monarchy. The peculiar object of his hatred 
was the Due de Montpensier, whom he assailed 
with vitriolic invective and satire. The inevitable 
encounter took place on the 12th March, 1870, and 
the Frenchman shot the Spaniard through the head. 
Enrique the republican was buried with solemn 
masonic rites in the cemetery of San Isidro ; his 
funeral dirge was the Marseillaise. On the door 
of his house some one nailed this inscription, " Here 
dwelt a Bourbon, the only honest man of his race, 
who for speaking the truth died on the field of 
honour." The epitaph was not unworthy of a 
descendant of Henri Quatre, 



282 A Queen at Bay 

Carlos the younger, Conde de Montemolin, proved 
even more troublesome than his cousin. Having 
eluded the vigilance of his custodians at Bourges, 
he appeared in London, and v^as cordially received 
by Lord Palmerston. His escape was the signal 
for a rising of his partisans in Cataluna, v^^hich soon 
assumed serious proportions. Cabrera once more 
appeared at the head of some six thousand men, 
and harried the country v^ith fire and sv^ord. But 
the suspicion that the Carlists were incited and 
financed by England out of hostility to the govern- 
ment of Madrid destroyed their chances of success. 
Yet the war, conducted with the ferocity of the 
former campaign, was not finally suppressed till the 
spring of 1 849, when Carlos Luis was trapped as he 
was about to enter Spain by some French custom- 
house officers. Vainly did the young Pretender 
offer his captors two thousand francs for his release. 
He was confined in the citadel of Perpignan, and 
the second Carlist war came to an end. 

Cristina, between civil strife, fierce family dis- 
sensions, and tangled political intrigues, found that 
her triumph had been dearly bought. She, the 
idol of the Madrid populace ten or twelve years 
before, could hardly appear in public without 
being insulted. In her husband, the people pro- 
fessed to see another Godoy. The whole country 
was ready to leap up and to tear down the 
throne, the moment the terrible pressure of the 
army was relaxed. The Moderates were in power, 



Crowns In Prospect and in Peril 283 

thanks to carefully engineered elections, but even 
from their ranks proceeded angry murmurs against 
the Queen-Mother. The nation had by this 
time awakened to a sense of the iniquity of the 
pretended marriage of the young Queen and 
her cousin. The two became estranged within a 
few weeks of their wedding, and Isabel showed 
every day a less submissive manner towards the 
mother who had wrecked her life. Cristina, who 
refused to believe she had done her daughter any 
wrong, was shocked and irritated by this rebellion 
to her authority. The cabinet formed: by her 
staunch friend Isturiz had fallen, and now her 
Majesty, contrary to her mother's advice, seemed 
disposed to dismiss the ministry that had succeeded 
it. When her triumph seemed complete, Cristina 
slowly realized that she was worsted and out- 
manoeuvred. For the moment, at all events, her 
daughter was beyond her control. She promptly 
sold out all her shares in various Spanish concerns, 
and raised a sum of nearly ^70,000 in anticipation 
of her pension from the government. Then, for 
the second time, she turned her back on Spain. 
Fearing the hostility of the people, she set out 
from Madrid at four o'clock in the morning, on 
March 8, 1847, accompanied by her husband and 
her two daughters, the Duque de San Carlos, and 
the faithful Isturiz. A few days later she reached 
Paris. To satisfy herself that she was a good and 
virtuous woman, she at once applied herself with 



284 A Queen at Bay 

great zest to religious exercises, and indulged during 
Lent in an ecstasy of self-denial. She built an 
oratory in the gardens of Malmaison. It is clear 
that the business of her daughter's marriage had 
begun at last to trouble her by no means sensitive 
conscience. Still she did not neglect her temporal 
interests. Though living almost in retreat, she 
transacted business every day with her stockbroker, 
her notary, and men of affairs ; and deliberated 
with her private council, composed of a judge of 
the Court of Cassation, an advocate in the High 
Court, and a member of the Council of State. She 
kept her finger on the pulse of Spain, thanks to 
the reports sent her by her spies around the Queen. 
The news was not good. Isabel had bestowed 
her affections on General Serrano, el honito Ministro 
(the pretty minister), as she had once called him. 
Palmerston, like the Queen-Mother, had his eyes 
on the palace of Madrid, and, not despairing yet 
of undoing Guizot's work, directed Bulwer to 
cultivate friendly relations with the favoured officer. 
" Lord Palmerston," says his agent and biographer, 
" looking at the young Queen's conduct as the 
natural result of the alliance she had been more 
or less compelled to contract, regarded her rather 
with interest and pity than with blame or reproach, 
and was for taking advantage of the attachment 
she had formed for the purpose of dissolving her 
own marriage, which, it was said, had never been 
consummated, for setting aside the Montpensier 



Crowns in Prospect and in Peril 285 

succession, and bringing his favourite progresistas 
into power. All this could only be accomplished 
by the influence of General Serrano. 

" The dissolution of the Queen's marriage was 
the only chance for her happy life or creditable 
reign. But the Spaniards are a decorous people. 
Some very respectable and respected men discussed 
very gravely the propriety of putting the King 
quietly out of the way by a cup of coffee ; but 
the scandal of a divorce shocked them." 

The ministers were equally shocked when they 
intercepted a love-letter from the general to the 
Queen ; and they ordered him to proceed at once 
to Pamplona to inspect the forces in that district. 
Serrano replied that, as a senator, he was in duty 
bound to assist at the deliberations of the Cortes, 
and refused to go. The ministry proposed to 
impeach him, and was, of course, dismissed by the 
Queen. What girl of seventeen would prefer her 
ministers to her sweetheart ? To Bulwer's huge 
delight, a new cabinet was formed composed of 
the general's personal friends, and having at its 
head Don Joaquin Pacheco. Serrano was supposed 
to be a Progressist, as the Liberals were now called, 
but he was an opponent of Espartero and was on 
good terms with the Moderates. Bulwer courted 
his favour, and obtained from him leave for the 
ex-Regent to return to Spain ; but that wary exile 
knew better than to trust himself to the mercies 
of his political opponents. The English am- 



286 A Queen at Bay 

bassador was, in the long run, outmanoeuvred as 
usual by the Moderates, who at one and the same 
time seemed willing to assist the favourite in his 
intrigues with the Queen, and did their best to 
undermine him in her regard. Serrano, says Bulwer, 
was an honest man and a good patriot, but he 
seems to have been a poor politician. 

The King-Consort, meanwhile, retired in dudgeon 
to the palace of El Pardo. Benavides, one of the 
ministers, was sent to remonstrate with him. " My 
dignity as a husband has been outraged," said his 
titular Majesty, " though no one can say that my 
pretensions are exaggerated. I am well aware that 
Isabelita doesn^t love me ; I don't reproach her 
for that, for ours was a marriage of policy, not 
of inclination. I am the more tolerant, since I 
don't love her myself. Nor did I particularly 
object to keeping up appearances, in order to avoid 
a disagreeable rupture. Perhaps Isabelita is more 
ingenuous or more outspoken than I, but she never 
could keep to this sort of hypocrisy, which, after 
all, the interests of the nation demand. I married 
[continued the King-Consort with engaging candour] 
because I had to marry, because I fancied the 
dignity of King ; I did well over the bargain ; 
I certainly wasn't going to throw the presents of 
fortune out of the window. I wished to be as 
tolerant towards others, as I want them to be 
towards me. I should never have objected to a 
favourite." 



Crowns in Prospect and in Peril 287 

This lucid exposition of his Majesty's views 
perplexed the minister. " But," he asked, " is it 
not the favour enjoyed by General Serrano that 
stands in the way of the reconciliation we desire to 
bring about? " 

" I don't deny it," said Francisco ; " that is the 
obstacle. Let him be dismissed, and I will welcome 
my spouse with open arms. I would have tolerated 
Serrano, I would have raised no objections if my 
person had not been attacked. He has been 
wanting in respect towards me. He has failed in 
the courtesy to which I have a right. I hate him. 
He is another Godoy, who doesn't know how to 
comport himself. Godoy, at least, had the sense 
to make himself agreeable to Carlos IV. The good 
of fifteen millions of people demands this sacrifice, 
as it demands others. 

" I am not intended for Isabelita," the Prince 
went on, " nor she for me. But people must be 
led to suppose the contrary. I wish to raise no 
difficulties. If Serrano goes, I will consent to a 
reconciliation." 

In fairness to his Majesty, it must be supposed 
that Serrano could have had very little tact in not 
being able to accommodate himself to a husband 
of such liberal views. The moderation of Francisco 
is less surprising than the unctuous audacity of 
Cristina, who having deliberately sacrificed her 
daughter to satisfy her own ambitions, dared to 
write to her as follows : " I may have been weak. 



288 A Queen at Bay 

1 am not ashamed to confess a fault which is 
buried in repentance. But I never did wrong to 
the husband to whom Providence destined me, and 
it was only when I was free from any of those ties 
that bind a woman, that 1 opened my heart to 
a love, which I have legitimized before God, that 
He might pardon me for having kept it secret 
from the beloved people to whose happiness I 
was devoted. I don't believe I have offended Him 
in elevating honourable obscurity to my own level. 
In obedience to my modest instincts, I sought the 

protection of God I don't wish to know 

the cause of your separation : I have heard both, 
and believe that you should forgive each other 
and resolve upon a peaceable existence, salutary for 
you and for the Spanish nation. Thus you will 
avoid harsh criticism, and the comments of the 
European cabinets. I beg you, therefore, as your 
mother, to return to your husband, to whom I 
write by the same post." 

If from the moment of the marriages of her 
daughters, Cristina had been entitled to any sym- 
pathy, she would certainly have forfeited it now. 
Having thrown her daughter on to a bed of thorns, 
she reproached her for not lying quietly on it. 
Her allusion to her having legitimized her marriage 
before God, thanks to the good offices of Senor 
Gonzalez Bravo and the Patriarch of the Indies, 
and the half-fear expressed that the Divinity might 
have been offended at her keeping her union secret. 



Crowns in Prospect and in Peril 289 

shows to what extent superstition may influence a 
woman extraordinarily shrewd and level-headed in 
the everyday affairs of life. 

In the end Serrano did go ; not out of respect 
for the wishes of Francisco and Cristina, but be- 
cause Isabel — affectionately described as a thorough 
woman and a thorough Spaniard — had got tired 
of him. He wa consoled with the Captain-General- 
ship of Granada, and avenged himself on the 
mistress who had discarded him by expelling her, 
years after, from her kingdom. Pacheco gave way 
to the masterful Narvaez, who determined to put 
an end to the palace scandal. On the 13th October, 
he drove out to El Pardo, and at four o'clock 
that afternoon brought back the King-Consort in 
triumph. The Queen, standing on the balcony, 
saw them arrive. Francisco was taken to her apart- 
ments, when a reconciliation was patched up, and 
he was then conducted to the rooms specially 
allotted to him. Isabel had no sooner recovered 
from the shock of this interview than she was 
informed that her mother had reappeared in Madrid. 
Sure enough, Cristina and Riansares, at the instiga- 
tion of Louis PhiHppe, had left Paris secretly, 
travelling incognito, and were here at the doors of 
the palace. Her Majesty is said to have received 
her mother and step- father with tears of joy. It 
is probable that she wept on finding herself in 
leading strings once more. Francisco was sum- 
moned, and the family dined together. Cristina 

19 



290 A Queen at Bay- 

was as smiling and gracious as ever. She looked 
at many of her daughter's attendants with amused 
curiosity. " What shocking people ! " we can 
imagine her saying ; " you must get rid of them, 
my dear." They were got rid of. In a week or 
two's time, Isabel found that nearly every one about 
her person was her mother's creature. At last 
she made a stand. To the dismissal of the Aya 
Dona Catalina and the Conde de Santa Coloma, 
she refused to consent. A council of the ministers, 
presided over by the majestic Narvaez and sup- 
ported by the persuasive Cristina, failed to overawe 
her. Finally her advisers told her they would 
resign if she did not give way on this point. Her 
Majesty was understood to say that they could 
do so as soon as they liked. The ministers then 
changed the subject. 

But though in domestic matters the Queen some- 
times had her way, the real rulers of the country 
were Cristina and Narvaez. They deserve some 
credit for having withstood the upheaval which cost 
Louis Philippe his throne. In March 1848 the 
revolution of Paris found an echo in Madrid, which 
was instantly suppressed, and, wonderful to relate, 
was not followed by any executions. The downfall 
of the King of the French set at naught all Cristina's 
elaborate intrigues. The Spanish marriages had 
united her family to a fallen dynasty, whose head 
was now plain " Mr. Smith " in England. During 
the invasion of the Tuileries by the mob, the safety 



Crowns in Prospect and in Peril 291 

of the Duchesse de Montpensier — the heiress-pre- 
sumptive of Spain — was for a moment doubtful. 
For the support of a broken reed, Cristina had 
bartered her daughter's happiness. It was a pitiful 
business, but we may be quite sure that the Queen- 
Mother told herself that she had acted for the best. 
And — strangest part of it all — Spain proved quite 
able to get on without the aid she had been at such 
pains to procure her. 

A sequel to the revolution of February was the 
expulsion of Bulwer from Madrid. Fearing that 
another catastrophe might be produced by the 
harsh and tyrannical measures of the Spanish 
government, Lord Palmerston instructed Bulwer to 
recommend the ministry to adopt a legal and con- 
stitutional course. Nowadays such a protest would 
be regarded in this country as an impertinence ; 
but at that time people thought a great deal more 
about the rights of men, and justice, and freedom, 
than about international courtesy. However, the 
Spanish government cannot be blamed for returning 
the despatch with indignant comment. Moreover, 
reports were circulated that the English ambassador 
himself was intriguing with the Progressists for the 
overthrow of the ministry. On the 17th May, 1848, 
Bulwer was ordered to leave Madrid within twenty- 
four hours. His conduct, he was told, had been 
condemned by his own government, against which 
no offence was intended in thus dismissing him ; 
moreover, his personal safety could not be guaran- 



29^ A Queen at Bay 

teed among a people whom his intrigues had out- 
raged. The ambassador of England briefly replied 
that he had no fear for his person : he relied on 
the might of his country — " abiding as much in 
him alone, amid a hostile population, as in those 
powerful armaments which, under provocation, 
Great Britain could at a single word call forth." 
What attitude his government would adopt his 
Excellency would not venture to predict. On 
the 1 8th May, he set out for England. 

Beyond the interruption for a couple of years 
of formal diplomatic relations between the two 
countries, this insult to our representative was left 
unavenged. England was at that time passing 
through an anti-revolutionary panic, and, in sym- 
pathy with reaction generally, was willing to forget 
this slight on her national honour. ^' The arbitrary- 
acts of Narvaez were approved as the vigorous 
efforts of authority to restore order. The liberal 
sentiments of Lord Palmerston were viewed with 
distrust." *'We are against liberty first and for 
England after," these opponents of the great states- 
man might have murmured. 



CHAPTER XVI 

THE END OF A QUEEN AND A WOMAN 

DURING the troubled inglorious years that 
followed Cristina's return to Madrid, Narvaez 
might have boasted that, if not the state, he was 
the government of Spain. The preservation of the 
monarchy is entirely due to him. It is for Spaniards 
to say whether on this account he is entitled to 
their gratitude. The Queen had grown up into a 
sensual, impulsive, kind-hearted woman, with no 
capacity whatever for government and no sense of 
responsibility. As she grew older, she became 
more impatient of the control of her mother, who left 
her very much to the tender mercies of the general. 
In more than one direction, Cristina had over- 
reached herself. The only result of the alliance 
with the House of Orleans had been to provide a 
French Prince with a home in Spain ; and now 
the King-Consort, intended to be a mere lay-figure, 
grew insubordinate and presumed to follow a policy 
of his own. In reconciling the royal pair, Cristina 
had set up in the court an influence counter to her 
own. For Francisco had developed into a r^action^ 



294 A Queen at Bay 

ary of the old type, such as had not been seen in 
the palace since the death of Fernando VII. 
Narvaez, harsh martinet though he was, recognized 
the need of some check on the royal authority ; 
Cristina had no rooted objection to a constitution, 
which she was always clever enough to evade ; but 
Francisco, like Don Carlos, believed in absolutism, 
unlimited and unrestrained. 

He was a feeble-minded youth, and had fallen 
an easy dupe to his confessor. Father Fulgencio, and 
to Don Manuel Quiroga, one of his personal atten- 
dants. This man was the brother of the Franciscan 
nun, Sor Maria Rafaela del Patrocinio, whose 
pretended miracles and revelations had given the 
government a great deal of trouble in 1836. In 
that year she declared that the devil had carried her 
off out of her cell, and taking her with him to 
Aranjuez, had shown her that the Queen-Mother 
was a wicked woman, and that her daughter was 
not and could not be Queen of Spain ; from which 
it would appear that the devil was an ally of Don 
Carlos. He next transported the nun to the other side 
of the Guadarrama, where he revealed to her other 
wickednesses indulged in by Cristina ; and finally 
deposited her on the roof of her convent in Madrid, 
where she was found next morning by the sisters. 
Soon after it was noised abroad that Sor Patrocinio 
had received the stigmata. She was examined by 
order of the government, when it was found that 
the wounds^ whatever might have been their origin, 



The End of a Queen and a Woman 295 

were healed. Convicted of seditious utterances, she 
was ordered to be confined in a convent of the most 
rigorous observance at Talavera de la Reina. She 
does not appear to have made any nocturnal ex- 
cursions during this period of seclusion, but in the 
course of a few years, she found her way back to 
Madrid, and became an inmate of the Convent of 
Jesus. Don Francisco, who heard her story from 
her brother's lips, was persuaded of her sanctity, 
and regarded all her pronouncements on questions 
of state as inspired. What passed between the 
nun and the kinglet is not exactly known, but she 
evidently persuaded him that he was the instrument 
chosen by God to put an end to constitutional 
government in Spain. To work on the supersti- 
tions and desires of Isabel was not difficult. In the 
early morning of the i8th October, 1849, Narvaez 
was informed that he and his colleagues were dis- 
missed. Had a thunderbolt descended into the 
general's coffee-cup, he could not have been more 
surprised. He hastened to the palace, and found 
her Majesty agitated but determined. Don Ramon 
having formally handed in his resignation withdrew, 
still in the dark as to the cause of his downfall. 

The next day Madrid was startled and then 
amused by the appointment of a most heterogeneous 
ministry, of which the principal members were 
Conde de Cleonard, General Balboa, and Cea 
Bermudez (who was at the moment at Lisbon). 
Before any of these gentlemen had time to realize 



296 A Queen at Bay 

what was expected of them, Isabel began to repent 
of her rashness, and sent for her mother to consult 
her in her perplexity. Cristina, however, was 
furiously angry, and vowed she would not re-enter 
the palace so long as Cleonard and Balboa remained 
in power. She attributed this sudden change in 
the ministry to Father Fulgencio, whom she de- 
scribed as a dangerous Carlist. Isabel now turned 
on her husband, and bitterly reproached him for 
his ill-advice. Never, she swore, would she be 
guided by him again. She then went ofF, accom- 
panied by the Duquesa de Gor, to visit her mother 
in the Calle de las Rejas. After half an hour's 
entreaties, Cristina consented to use her good offices 
with Narvaez. The general was angry, and at 
first refused to resume office. Cristina waxed 
warmer in her entreaties, painted the state of the 
country in alarming colours, and at last prevailed 
upon him to accept the presidency of the council. 
General Cleonard, meanwhile, had gone to the 
palace to consult with the Queen. He was told 
to return in a few hours. When he did so, he 
was told to countersign a decree dismissing General 
Balboa and appointing the Conde de San Luis in 
his room. The Queen then went on to dismiss 
him and all his other colleagues, reinstating Narvaez 
and the ministry of two days before. Thus fell 
the famous " Lightning Cabinet " after an existence 
of barely forty-eight hours. 

Narvaez at once put his heavy hand on those 



The End of a Queen and a Woman 297 

who had engineered this ridiculous intrigue. The 
unfortunate Cleonard was relieved of his command 
of the Royal Military College ; General Balboa 
was banished to Ceuta ; Quiroga was expelled from 
Madrid ; and Father Fulgencio despatched to 
Archidona in Andalucia, with orders to stay there. 
Sor Patrocinio was promptly restored to the com- 
munity at Talavera de la Reina. Nor did the 
general spare the luckless little King. He straight- 
way deprived his Majesty of his functions of keeper 
of the royal household and patrimony, and refused 
to allow him to hide his shame at his discomfiture 
at Valladolid. Francisco knew, however, that it 
was in his power to destroy the credit of his wife's 
throne. He sulked and threatened throughout 
the winter, and in February 1850 he announced 
his intention of leaving the Queen and living at 
Aranjuez. Narvaez stormed and bullied in vain. 
Cristina the indispensable and the persuasive 
Riansares were called in. The minister had to 
accept the terms ofii'ered by his insignificant Majesty. 
The control of the interior of the royal household 
was restored to him ; and Father Fulgencio came 
back from Andalucia, with a charming actress for 
travelling companion. The holy man was promised 
the bishopric of Cartagena. 

The prestige of the King-Consort was decidedly 
augmented by the longed-for birth of a child to 
his wife in the following July. The infant came 
as a surprise, and questioning glances were directed 



298 A Queen at Bay 

towards his Majesty. But Don Francisco appeared 
proud and gratified, Cristina radiant with delight. 
" The child won't live," said the Liberals ; " it 
was never intended to." The suspicions vaguely 
expressed were untenable. Now Louis Philippe 
had fallen, neither Cristina nor any of her family 
or party could have had any special reasons for 
placing the Due de Montpensier or his child upon 
the throne of Spain. The sinister prophecies were, 
however, fulfilled. The baby lived for three days 
only — long enough to inspire his mother with frantic 
grief for his loss. 

Another year and six months passed. Again 
it was rumoured that the Queen was about to 
become a mother. In December the Infanta Isabel 
was born, and showed every disposition to live. 
Montpensier was now barred, said the Spaniards, 
and they accorded the Queen and the little stranger 
a frantic welcome as her Majesty went to return 
thanks at the church of the Atocha. But all 
Spaniards did not love the Queen. There was 
among the crowd a strange, saturnine priest. 
Merino by name, who combined the Catholic faith 
with a fervent Liberalism. He pressed forward to 
offer the Queen a petition, as it seemed. As the 
happy mother extended her hand to receive it, the 
man dealt her a blow with a poniard. ** I am 
wounded ! " she shrieked, and fainted. Merino 
was seized by the guards. Every one's first thought 
was for Isabel. She opened her eyes, and cried. 



The End of a Queen and a Woman 299 

*' My child ! my child ! " A big guardsman 
held the infant high in the air before her, to 
show it was safe from all harm. The blow had 
been broken by the Queen's corset ; her wound 
was of the slightest. Merino, despite his intended 
victim's entreaties, was garrotted and his body 
burnt. He met his fate with the composure usual 
in men who die for their political or religious 
convictions. 

The assassin's blow had rendered the Queen good 
service. She became the most popular person in 
her dominions. Seeing her good-nature, her prodigal 
liberality, her generosity, people very sensibly told 
themselves that her love-affairs were no concern 
of theirs. Had her undoubted love for her subjects 
taught her the art of governing them, the years of 
her reign might have exceeded those of Victoria's. 
She disliked Narvaez — feared, perhaps, that he 
might play the part of Espartero — and this time 
found her mother on hen side. Cristina knew 
that for her there was no political future. She 
and her husband cared only for money, and saw 
in the political game only the chances and means 
of adding to their already enormous wealth. She 
lent her support to the clever financier Brabo 
Murillo, who supplanted Narvaez. Louis Napoleon's 
coup d'etat seemed to have ended the period of 
gropifig after freedom and righteousness, and to 
have inaugurated the reign of force and the material. 
Brabo Murillo seriously meditated sweeping away 



300 A Queen at Bay 

the constitution, but even the Conservatives in 
Spain believed in some form of representative 
government, and the conspiracy was abandoned. 
Cristina, who dreaded a revolution, strongly dis- 
approved the plot. She sent her secretary, Don 
Antonio Rubio, to the prime minister, to inform 
him that, if he persisted in his design, she would 
at once leave Spain with all her family, and would 
make her husband renounce all his offices and 
dignities. She would not witness, she declared, 
the destruction of a system which she had herself 
founded. 

In the early fifties the railway mania spread to 
Spain. Cristina and Riansares were not slow to 
recognize the financial possibilities of the new 
enterprises. We find his Grace chairman of the 
Northern Railway Company, and associated with 
his brother, the Conde de Retamoso, and the 
banker Salamanca, in promoting a great variety 
of syndicates. He and his wife were accused 
of trafficking in concessions, and of resorting 
to all sorts of devices to raise and to lower 
the prices of shares. It seems, however, that the 
conduct of his Grace gave great satisfaction to the 
shareholders in his companies, whom, I suppose, 
it was his business to please. The distinction 
between things lawful and unlawful in matters of 
high finance seems to be very finely drawn, and 
I am unable to say if the Duke overstepped the 
limit. He never presented a false balance-sheet. 



The End of a Queen and a Woman 301 

which it appears is definitely regarded as a wrongful 
act ; and we are not told that he formed one 
company to buy another in which he was interested, 
which is perhaps legitimate. The projects with 
which he was connected, also, did materialize. He 
never floated a syndicate to acquire an imaginary 
mine in Nova Zembla or the Falkland Islands. His 
principal accuser, too, was Manuel de la Concha, 
who had always been his bitter foe, and who, being 
a rude soldier, was probably incapable of appreciating 
the subtleties of financial ethics. 

The Spanish people generally shared this sim- 
plicity, and regarded Cristina and her spouse with 
suspicion and detestation. It was a little unfair. 
The Queen-Mother, as we have seen, was opposed 
to the reactionary tendencies of the cabinet, and 
enjoyed very much less influence than she was 
credited with. She was just a middle-aged mother 
of a family, such as was to be found behind the 
counters of every shop in Madrid and Naples, bent 
on piling up money for her children and marrying 
them well. She was no better and no worse than 
most of the women of her own age in the Spanish 
capital. She had no ideas of right and wrong 
beyond those to be derived from the catechism, 
wherein speculation and selling at a profit are not 
specifically forbidden. She had taken advantage 
of her position to add to her wealth, but, she 
might have reminded the nation, you must not 
muzzle the ox that treadeth out the corn. She 



30-2 A Queen at Bay 

had no wish to harm any one, yet at the close of 
the year 1853 she was the best-hated woman in 
all Spain. 

It was not she but her daughter who should 
have been blamed for the repeated changes of 
ministries and the ever-recurring dissolutions of 
the Cortes, which had reduced parliamentary 
government to a ghastly farce. Narvaez had left 
the country, and strong men were rigorously ex- 
cluded from the direction of affairs. In other 
respects, Isabel's choice of advisers seems to have 
been a matter of caprice, but each was worse than 
his predecessor. The country was going downhill 
at an alarming rate. One of the premiers, the 
Conde de San Luis, resolutely attempted to gag 
the press. In retaliation, practically no attention 
was devoted by the newspapers to the birth of 
another child to the Queen. But from the editorial 
offices there issued a special sheet, vehemently 
denouncing the unconstitutional and oppressive 
conduct of the government ; while a second 
publication, called the Murcielago^ was circulated 
broadcast and called for vengeance on the Queen's 
advisers, on the Queen-Mother, and on the Duque 
de Riansares. This was followed up by a leaflet, 
thrust under every door in Madrid, calling on 
Spaniards to rise in defence of their liberties. " Are 
there no swords in the land of the Cid '^. " 

O'Donnell's blade leaped from its scabbard. He, 
the leader of the Moderates, the intrepid chief who 




p. 302] 



From a lithosrafyh after A. Maurin 
MARIA CRISTINA 

QUEEN DOWAGER OF SPAIN 



The End of a Queen and a Woman 303 

had fought for Cristina ten years before, now put 
himself at the head of her enemies. The Conser- 
vatives in Spain had sown the wind and reaped the 
whirlwind. They had fought hard to restrain the 
liberty of their fellow-citizens, and had now to 
battle for their own. Drawing off the regiments 
attached to him from the garrison of Madrid, the 
general effected a junction at Canillejas with the 
forces of other officers in sympathy with the move- 
ment. The ministry, alive to its danger, sent word 
to Isabel to return to the capital from the Escorial, 
and sent General Anselmo Blaser to crush the re- 
volt. A battle was fought at Vicalvaro. Both sides 
claimed the victory. Blaser returned to Madrid 
with a few prisoners, but O'Donnell captured 
Aranjuez, and from Manzanares on the 7th July, 
1854, issued an appeal to Liberals and Conservatives 
alike to rise in defence of the constitution. The 
proclamation echoed through Spain like the blast 
of the tempest. Barcelona — the ever-turbulent — 
flew to arms. The revolution spread from town 
to town. Down went the ministry. The dis- 
tracted Isabel called Fernandez de Cordova to the 
helm. He was a soldier and a man of action ; and 
he needed all his resolution now. 

The downfall of the San Luis Cabinet was an- 
nounced to the people of Madrid at a great bull 
fight. With their ugliest passions excited by the 
savage show, the crowd streamed into the streets, 
aglow with triumph, and shouting for the punish- 



304 A Queen at Bay 

ment of the fallen ministers and of the detested 
Queen-Mother. Cristina heard the tocsin ringing 
from every belfry in Madrid. Hurriedly she took 
refuge with her husband in the royal palace. Her 
daughters, the Condesa de Vista Alegre and the 
Marquesa del Castillejo, were disguised, and sent 
off to Valencia, thence to be shipped off to France. 
The city was in revolt. A mob of armed peasants, 
who had flocked in at the call of the bells, sur- 
rounded the Queen-Mother's palace in the Calle 
de las Rejas, and broke the windows. Then they 
set fire to the four sentry-boxes. The commander 
of the little guard of thirty artillerymen boldly 
expostulated with the rioters, who contented them- 
selves with dragging the boxes away and making 
a bonfire with them in front of the ministries. 
But a crowd of a different sort immediately collected, 
forced in the gates, and swarmed up the staircase of 
Cristina's home. In their disappointment at finding 
that their prey had escaped them, they tore down 
the hangings and smashed everything they could 
lay their hands on. Their work accomplished, or 
alarmed in the midst of it, they issued into the 
street, and were instantly fired upon by a column 
sent by Cordova at the Queen's instance to protect 
her mother's property. In the tumult some of 
Cristina's servants made their way into the palace, 
and saved some of her most confidential letters and 
deeds. By accident or design, some one set fire to 
a curtain, and in a few minutes the whole place was 



The End of a Queen and a Woman 305 

ablaze. The building itself was spared, but the 
interior was gutted. That was the end of Cristina's 
last home in Spain. 

" Crush the canaille ! " Isabel commanded Cordova, 
and for three days every street in Madrid was a 
battlefield between the troops and the people. But 
from the country came the news that O'Donnell 
was gathering strength, that the government was 
surely foundering. To O'Donnell the Queens 
would not surrender. In their despair they turned 
to Espartero, who, permitted to return from England, 
had quietly settled down to watch events in his 
native province. He was the only man in Spain 
that could make terms between the sovereign and 
the people. Summoned to the capital, he sent first 
an aide-de-camp, whose coarse language and stern 
rebukes almost made Isabel repent of her surrender. 
But on the 28th July, ^854, the ex-Regent entered 
Madrid in triumph amid the frantic plaudits of 
the people. All would be right, he told them ; in 
his hands the constitution was safe. That day there 
was a strange meeting at the palace : Espartero was 
face to face with the Queen whose throne he had 
saved, the Queen-Mother whose downfall he had 
brought about years before, the general who 
had raised the standard of revolt against him. Now 
they consulted together how the throne of Spain 
might again be saved. 

But there was a problem yet more difficult to 
solve. With cheers for the constitution and for 

20 



3o6 A Queen at Bay 

Espartero were mingled cries of " Death to the 
robber ! " Cristina heard the cry, and knew that 
it was meant for her. She had faced the Spaniards 
before at La Granja, at Barcelona, at Valencia. She 
was not frightened of them now. They talked of 
her escaping. No, she declared, she would leave 
that palace only as a Queen. She was at bay. It 
was not only the crowd that demanded vengeance 
upon her. A deputation of prominent politicians 
and lawyers waited on Espartero and insisted that 
she should be brought to trial before the Cortes. 
She had rendered the government of the country 
impossible, and had stolen crown property. Espar- 
tero and O'Donnell promised the deputation that 
the Queen-Mother should not leave Madrid by 
day or by night, openly or furtively. But they 
knew they must break the promise, partly because 
the charges could never have been proved, partly 
because it was impossible to put the mother of the 
reigning sovereign on her trial. 

For a month Cristina dwelt practically a prisoner 
in her daughter's palace, which was watched closely 
by armed citizens and peasants. Go in disguise, she 
would not. At last, at four in the morning of the 
28th August, a carriage was driven up to the prin- 
cipal entrance of the royal abode, escorted by two 
squadrons of horse commanded by General Garrigo. 
At the sound of the wheels, Cristina embraced her 
nervous, weeping daughter and her trim, frightened 
son-in-law. Turning to the others, she bade them 



The End of a Queen and a Woman 307 

farewell in her old winning, gracious manner, and 
descended the stairs up which Fernando had led 
her as his bride, five-and-twenty years before. 
Beside her walked her old rival, Espartero ; behind 
her, the general who had offered to save her at 
Valencia. Her husband, unconcerned and unruffled, 
brought up the rear. '' I shall come back," said 
her Majesty, as she bowed stiffly to the generals. 
Riansares took his place beside her, the carriage 
door was shut, and with the cavalry clattering behind 
them, they drove at full gallop through the silent 
white streets of Madrid. The city, exhausted by 
its frenzies, slept soundly — even the fiercest revolu- 
tionary was abed. When Madrid awoke, the 
Queen-Mother was well on her way to Portugal. 
She passed out of Spain, and out of the ken of 
history. 

Great was the wrath of her enemies when they 
found she had eluded them ; bitter were the re- 
proaches they addressed to Espartero and 0*Donnell ; 
but, in the end, every one was glad they had got 
rid of her. A parliamentary commission was 
appointed to inquire into her acts, but the only 
possible verdict was Non-proven. In the turmoil 
that followed she was soon forgotten. O'Donnell 
supplanted Espartero, Narvaez supplanted O'Donnell. 
Cristina settled down to enjoy her wealth at Paris, 
and there and at her summer villa at Ste. Adresse 
near Havre, watched and waited for the inevitable 
sequel. Meanwhile her eldest boy — he for whom 



3oS A Queen at Bay 

the crown of Ecuador had been dreamed of — died at 
Malmaison at the age of twenty. Riansares had still 
three sons — the Duque de Tarancon, the Conde de 
Gracia, and the Conde del Recuerdo ; and three 
daughters, of whom the two eldest married Prince 
Ladislas Czartoryski and the Neapolitan Principe del 
Drago. Their lot in life was pleasanter than their 
half-sister's. In 1868 Isabel II. came flying over 
the frontier, an exile like her mother. And thus, 
everybody thought, ends Cristina's lifelong struggle 
to keep her daughter and her dynasty upon the 
throne ; for this then was Carlos disinherited over 
thirty years before. 

But it was not the end. Spain, strangely enough, 
was not yet weary of kings. She welcomed the 
son of Isabel II. to her tottering throne, and 
the crown rested securely on his brow. Cristina 
had seen Louis Philippe fall ; she saw the throne 
of her kinsmen at Naples swept away for ever, 
the upstart Second Empire come crashing down. 
But her grandson was King of Spain ; she had not 
lost the battle she had fought long years ago with 
the Princesses of Braganga, with Carlos, and with 
Calomarde. Very old and widowed — for her hand- 
some guardsman had died in 1873 — ^^^ travelled 
once more to Madrid in January 1878, to witness 
the culmination of her old Orleanist policy. 
For her grandson, Alfonso XIL, was to wed his 
beloved cousin. Dona Mercedes, the daughter of 
Montpensier. And so Cristina's dreams actually 



The End of a Queen and a Woman 309 

came to pass, though she benefited in no way by 
them. Perhaps, as she journeyed back to her home 
on that windy clifF above the English Channel, 
the old woman hoped to see a Prince of Asturias 
acclaimed as heir to the thrones of France and 
Spain. It was not to be ; Montpensier's hopes 
perished in the coffin of his childless daughter ; 
but Cristina was not to know that. For on the 
29th August, 1878, while the Norman watering- 
place looked its brightest and gayest^ poor exiled 
Isabel was summoned in hot haste from Paris to 
close her mother's eyes. The special train came 
too late. Cristina de Borbon had already died in 
the seventy-third year of her age. 

She was buried in the Escorial — the only wife 
of Fernando VII. whose child had sat on the 
throne of Spain. The nation had long since for- 
gotten and forgiven her — forgiven her avarice and 
her absorption in the interests of her family, 
forgotten that she had instituted the constitutional 
monarchy of Spain. She was a human woman, 
always thinking more of her husband, her children, 
and immediate dependents than of the millions of 
unseen and unknown Spaniards whose custody a 
droll tradition had committed to her. She wished 
evil to none ; from the deliberate cruelties so con- 
stantly resorted to by other sovereigns of her house, 
she shrank in disgust. Had she been less a woman, 
she would have made a worse ruler. If she never 



310 A Queen at Bay 

understood the responsibilities of her high office, 
she never flinched from its dangers. At bay against 
the revolution during two-thirds of her life, she 
never relapsed into abject fear of modern ideas or 
tried to quench liberty in wholesale bloodshed. 
She was no fanatic, as so many Bourbons have 
been. Without education or experience, she was 
called upon to face the most powerful combination 
of enemies and to sail out of the familiar harbour 
of despotism into the unknown sea of constitu- 
tional liberties. She could not see far ahead ; but 
she went on cheerfully, distrusting the people, 
but never hating them. She would have been 
better understood in England than in Spain. " With 
the constitutional government of this realm, I have 
always been identified," she wrote just before her final 
expulsion. She was not quite justified in making 
that boast. But she was two things of price — a 
brave woman and a kindly-natured Queen. 



AUTHORITIES 

The principal works consulted in the preparation of this 
volume are the following : 

Pirala, Historia de la guerra civil; Burgos, Anales del 
reinado de Isabel II. ; Bermejo, Estafeta del Palacio ; 
Fernandez de los Rios, Estudios politicos ; Mirafiores, 
Memorias ; Cordova, Memorias ; Florez, Vida de Espartero; 
Vida politica y militar de Narvdez ; Llauder, Memorias ; 
Pacheco, Historia de la regencia de Maria Cristina ; Cristina, 
historia contempordnea ; Cortina, Dictamen dado d S.M. la 
Reina Cristina ; Historia del Ecuador. 

Hubbard, Histoire contemporaine de VEspagne ; Auguet 
de St. Sylvain, Chapitre dans I'histoire de Charles V. ; 
Custine, L'Espagne sous Ferdinand VII. ; Didier, Une 
annee en Espagne ; Dembowski, Deux ans en Espagne ; 
Thureau-Dangin, Histoire de la monarchie de Juillet ; 
Journal des Debats, 1840-41. 

Walton, Revolutions of Spain; Henningsen, Most 
Striking Events in a Campaign with Zumalacarregui ; 
Life and Letters of Washington Irving ; Bulwer, Life of 
Lord Palmer ston ; Times, 1840-53 ; Slidell Mackenzie, 
A Year in Spain. 



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